LINCOLN 


AND 


ANN  RUTLEDGE 

An  Idyllic  Epos  of  the  Early  North-West. 
SOUVENIR 

of  Abraham  Lincoln's  Birth-Day,  1912 

BY 
DENTON  J.  SNIDER 


ST.  LOUIS 

SIGMA  PUBLISHING  CO. 
210  PINE  ST. 


4-5  7. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


Page 

BOOK  FIRST. 

New  Salem 5 

BOOK  SECOND. 

Doctor  and  Squire 14 

BOOK  THIRD. 

Wainwright  and  Blacksmith  ....      38 

BOOK  FOURTH. 

Abraham  Lincoln 61 

BOOK  FIFTH. 

Ann  Rutledge 82 

BOOK  SIXTH. 

The  People 103 

(3) 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


Page 

BOOK  SEVENTH. 

Lincoln  and  Ann  Rutledge     .     s    .     .     130 

BOOK  EIGHTH. 

Vandalia      .    .    f    .    .    .    .    .'    ~.    .    152 

BOOK  NINTH. 

The  Letters     .    .    .    Z  >    T    4    ^    .    176 

BOOK  TENTH. 

Back  from  the  Capital  .......    195 

BOOK  ELEVENTH. 

Under  the  Mulberry 222 

BOOK  TWELFTH. 

The  Double  Debate  .......    239 

BOOK  THIRTEENTH, 

The  Passing  of  Ann  Rutledge     ...    282 

BOOK  FOURTEENTH. 

The  New  Life 299 

BOOK  FIFTEENTH. 

The  New  Migration 308 

BOOK  SIXTEENTH. 

Resurgam    .    .    .   ,?.   •    ,    ....    320 

Historic  Intimations 336 

(4) 


Lincoln  and  Ann  Rutledge, 


I0oh  Jfirat. 


New  Salem. 

List  to  the  clang  of  the  bell  with  its  clamorous 
trills  from  the  belfry, 

Rollicking  round  the  little  red  schoolhouse 
perched  on  the  hillock, 

Calling  together  the  town  to  the  resonant 
clack  of  its  clapper, 

Tinkling  far  over  the  valley  its  silvery  un- 
dulations, 

Till  it  drops  to  a  warble  in  tune  with  the 
Sangamon's  ripple, 

And  in  a  whisper  of  music  it  dies  on  the  dis- 
tant prairie. 

(5) 


6      LINCOLN    AND    ANN    RUTLEDGE—BOOK   I. 

Hark !  how  it  breathes  its  last  breath  in  melo- 
dious carols  concentric, 

Weaving  with  wavelets  of  sound  the  tremu- 
lous heart  of  the  hearer, 

Who  in  harmonious  throbs  for  a  moment 
floats  over  the  border 

Till  he  is  rapt  to  the  rhythm  of  spheres  in 
chorus  majestic, 

Feeling  afar  the  cosmical  echo  of  ancient 
creation, 

When  the  sun  and  the  moon  and  the  stars 
were  singing  together. 


Now  the  tongue  of  the  bell  has  lisped  its  mel- 
lifluous message, 

And  has  enwreathed  in  its  tenderest  rounds 
the  listening  farm-house 

To  the  first  milestone  from  town  at  the  pray- 
erful calm  of  the  noon- tide ; 

Even  the  ox  of  the  field  knows  it  well,  and 
looks  up  from  his  grazing, 

While  the  dog  in  response  will  utter  a  howl 
from  the  barnyard, 

And  the  big  chanticleer  will  perch  on  the  top 
of  his  dunghill, 

Strutting  amid  his  polygamous  household  and 
crowing  defiance. 


NEW  SALEM.  7 

Meantime  the  farmer  Has  quitted  his  labor  of 
cradling  the  harvest, 

And  the  raking  and  sheaving  and  shocking 
the  sheaves  of  the  grainfield; 

Soon  he  has  saddled  old  sorrel  and  starts  on 
a  jog  to  the  village 

Where  he  will  meet  all  his  neighbors  and  lis- 
ten to  Abraham  Lincoln 

Telling  the  manful  task  of  the  time  in  drollery 
storied, 

How  the  migration  of  peoples  has  swept  from 
the  East  to  the  Westland, 

Bringing  the  dawn  of  a  world  which  is  new 
in  the  line  of  the  ages, 

Piloting  over  the  prairies  the  passage  of  civ- 
ilisation. 


Gathered  already  in  arguing  groups  are  the 
chiefs  of  the  township, 

Through  their  talk  oft  buzzes  the  name  of 
President  Jackson, 

Now  the  well-head  of  words  for  every  tongue 
in  the  Nation, 

Who  had  the  power  of  doing  the  deed  attuned 
to  the  folk-soul, 

Also  of  writing  his  name  on  the  land  in  lum- 
inous letters, 

Which  would  always  relume  in  the  flame  of 
party  discussion. 


g      LINCOLN   AND   ANN   RUTLEDGE—BOOK   I. 

Stout  Ebenezer,  the  Squire,  well  rounded  in 

brain  and  in  body, 
Eight  decider  of  lawsuits,  the  voice  of  the 

village's  justice, 
Strides  up  the  knoll  to  the  well-sweep  and 

dips  out  a  drink  of  fresh  water, 
With  the  new  gourd  which  hung  at  the  well 

in  front  of  the  schoolhouse. 
Worthy  ambition  was  his :  to  be  the  commun- 
ity* s  builder, 
And  overseer  self-appointed  in  charge  of  the 

general  welfare; 
With  him  are  talking  in  shirt  sleeves  two 

workmen  of  handicraft  clever, 
Gray-haired   William   the   wainwright,    and 

big-thewed  Peter  the  blacksmith, 
Both  of  them  integral  men  of  the  town's  best 

communal  spirit. 


Doctor  Palmetto  was  present,  snapping  satir- 
ical flashes 

Openly  at  the  whole  world  which  slyly  includ- 
ed himself,  too, 

Chiefly,  however,  at  Lincoln  he  fired  his  bat- 
tery scornful. 

He  was  the  one  only  man  in  the  town  who 
had  studied  at  college, 

Crumbs  of  his  lore  he  strewed  in  his  talk,  for 
instance,  the  names  of  the  muscles. 


NEW  SALEM.  9 

Grave  James  Butledge  failed  not,  erst  the 
community 's  founder, 

Aged  but  lofty  in  mien  and  retaining  his  chi- 
valrous manner, 

Father  of  blooming  Ann,  the  rarest  rose  of 
the  village ; 

And  she  also  had  come  to  see  and  to  hear 
with  her  parent 

Just  this  orator  Lincoln,  whose  words  had  a 
heart  in  their  cadence, 

While  his  tenderest  tones  would  tremble  in 
tune  with  her  glances. 


Soon  the  tillers  had  flocked  from  their  toil 

on  each  side  of  the  country, 
Blent  with  their  spirit  and  speech  still  lay 

the  great  fight  with  the  Indian, 
And  their  perils  upon  the  frontier  when  the] 

land  was  first  settled, 
"When  the  savage 's  tomahawk  spared  not  even 

the  suckling. 
Every  man  in  the  crowd  had  his  valorous 

venture  to  tell  of, 
How  he  waylaid  and  slew  in  his  trap  the 

treacherous  red-skin, 
Or  had  driven  him  headlong  over  the  wroth 

Mississippi. 
Living  and  throbbing  in  rage  still  rose  the 

strife  of  the  races, 


10    LINCOLN   AND   ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK   I. 

Which  enkindled  the  border  in  furious  blazes 
of  warfare 

For  the  lands  of  the  Northwest,  aye  for  the 
continent  total. 

And  that  struggle  each  borderer  bore  in  his 
bosom  down  deepest, 

Long  in  a  line  transmitted  from  father  and 
grandfather  also, 

E'en  from  the  grandfather's  father  descend- 
ed the  heritage  hostile, 

Bringing  the  ancestor's  feud  from  the  shore 
of  the  distant  Atlantic.' 


So  the  people  assembled,  still  wrought  up  with 

memories  warlike, 
And  they  had  their  own  hero  now  present, 

Abraham  Lincoln, 
Who  had  fought  against  Black  Hawk,  the 

reddest  of  all  the  red  devils, 
Who  had  headed  the  volunteers  valiant  of 

Sangamon  County 
Up  to  the  foe 's  front  line,  but  never  got  sight 

of  an  Indian. 
Him  all  the  people  had  chosen  as  Captain  in 

stress  of  their  struggle, 
Thrice  he  enlisted  to  fight  and  stayed  till  the 

danger  was  over. 


NEW   SALEM.  H 

True  pioneer,  he  was  stamped  with  the  traits 

of  his  fathers  before  him, 
Who  had  faced  the  frontier  of  their  country 

for  five  generations, 
Ever  in  movement  along  with  the  stride  of 

their  race  to  the  westward. 
Abraham  Lincoln 's  grandfather  also  was  Ab- 
raham Lincoln, 
Who  had  been  slain  by  an  Indian's  bullet 

shot  from  an  ambush ; 
Still  that  bullet  would  throb  at  times  in  the 

brain  of  the  grandson, 
Making  him  feel  the  vengeance  of  race  e'en 

when  he  resisted, 
For  the  two  sides,  to  avenge  and  forgive, 

lurked  deep  in  his  nature. 
All  the  folk  were  flocking  around  him,  whose 

soul  he  well  represented, 
Getting  ready  to  vote  for  themselves  in  vot- 
ing for  Lincoln, 
For  he  had  lived  just  their  life,  and  gone 

through  their  fiery  trial. 
Soldiers  were  there  who  bragged  of  the  deeds 

of  their  valorous  captain, 
And  repeated  the  stories  he  told  in  the  lull 

of  the  campaign ; 
Thus  were  tripping  the  tongues  of  a  hundred 

that  day  in  New  Salem, 
All  were  electioneering   and  fighting  anew 

the  old  battles. 


12    LINCOLN  AND  'ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 

Look !  a  character  weaves  of  a  sudden  around 

through  the  masses, 
That  was  Jack  Kelso,  good  fellow  general, 

yet  good  for  nothing, 
Never  once  missing  his  chance  at  a  verse  or 

his  turn  at  the  bottle, 
Long  since  known  to  the  town  as  its  poet, 

and  laureled  its  rhymesmith, 
Needful  vocation  as  well  as  that  of  the  doc- 
tor or  blacksmith, 
Though  he  must  work  for  nothing  and  add  his 

own  board  to  the  bargain, 
Poesy  being  its  own  sweet  reward  on  the  San- 

gamon  sluggish. 


But  forget  not  the  man,  the  living  conduit  of 

knowledge 
For  the  young  and  the  old  of  the  village,  the 

schoolmaster  Graham; 
To  whose  name  the  true  title  had  slid  down 

the  ages  from  Homer — 
Mentor  of  yore,  the  appearance  divine  of  the 

Goddess  of  Wisdom. 
To  the  youth  who  was  longing  to  learn  of  the 

deeds  of  the  fathers. 
Mentor  Graham,  the  master,  all  named  him 

by  right  of  his  office, 
Frontier  pedagogue,  bearing  the  torch  of  the 

past  to  the  future 


XEW  SALEM.  13 

Eight  on  the  line  of  division  between  them, 

the  zone  of  their  mingling; 
Charactered  was  he  in  word  and  in  deed  by 

his  life  on  the  border, 
"With  a  gleam  of  prophecy  in  him,  which 

shone  resurrection, 
Nor  were  wanting  some  far-back  flashes  of 

sage  superstition, 
Which  believed  still  the  fact  of  the  Fates  and 

retributive  Furies. 
Though  he  knew  no  Greek,  some  scraps  he 

had  picked  up  of  Latin 
From  an  old  grammar  he  learned  once  by 

heart,  and  from  an  old  law  book ; 
But  as  he  sauntered  one  day  deep -sorrowed 

around  in  a  graveyard, 
From  a  tombstone  he  took  and  treasured  the 

word  most  real  of  his  soul's  faith — 
That  was  the  word  he  chose  for  the  motto  in- 
scribed on  the  school-bell 
When  it  rose  perched  on  the  belfry  to  riyg 

overhead  to  the  town-folk — 
Hoary  device  with  letters  antique  in  the  old 

Eoman  language, 
Word  invoking  a  weird  meditation  in  all  who 

might  see  it, 

Mystical  name  of  a  world  that  seems  going 
yet  coming — EESUEGAM. 


100k 


Doctor  and  Squire. 

1 '  What  is  the  matter  I    This  town  has  already 

slowed  up  to  a  standstill; 
Climbing  its  hill-side  it  stops — why,  even  it 

starts  to  go  backward — 
Sick  is  the  place,  I  say,  with  a  mortal  malady 

dying." 


Wroth  was  the  mood  of  the  Doctor,  whisking 

his  tongue  like  a  skalpel, 
Loving  with  words  to  draw  blood  on  the 

world,  as  if  lancing  a  patient- 
Doctor  Palmetto,  lettered  leech  of  the  San- 

gamon  Valley, 
Quick  to  spy  the  disease  and  delighting  to 

dwell  on  the  symptoms, 

(14) 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  15 

Be  the  seat  of  disorder  in  man  or  the  State 

or  the  Nation. 
But  just  now  he  was  feeling  the  pulse  of  ailing 

New  Salem, 
Little  town  of  the  border,  once  eager  to  be 

the  great  city, 
Dreaming  to  rival  old  Borne  in  its  swell  of 

an  empire's  ambition, 
But  with  a  droop  in  its  hope  now  unable  to 

take  a  step  further ; 

Still  the  Doctor's  fast  breath  kept  winnow- 
ing words  like  a  wind-mill, 
Which  could  never  be  stayed  till  the  whiz  of 

its  wheel  was  expended; 
Thus  he  pumped  up  the  past  in  speeches  of 

sore   reminiscence : 


"  Three  years  ago  I  reached  here — what  a 

life  on  this  hill- top ! 
Hous.es  sprang  up  over  night,  the  mechanic 

and  merchant 
Hurried  hitherward  after  the  throng  of  the 

onstreaming  people; 
In  the  wake  of  their  wains  which  sailed  one 

after  the  other 
Over  the  prairie's    green    ocean,    I  floated 

prospecting  my  future, 
Which  uplifted  itself  a  colossus  just  where 

I  stand  now, 


16    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  It. 

Bidding  me  halt  on  this  spot  and  tie  down 

my  fate  to  this  hillock. 
That  was  soon  after  I  quitted  with  honors 

my  Medical  College, 
.With  a  diploma  which  scoffing  me  looks  from 

its  frame  in  my  office; 
Maledict  be  the  day  I  strode  up  yon  slope  to 

your  village ! '  ' 


Swiftly  the  storm-stressed  Doctor,  through 
the  tense  strain  of  his  feeling, 

Gave  a  spank  with  the  flat  of  his  hand  to  the 
innocent  pine-box 

"Which  he  sat  on  to  argue  in  front  of  the  store 
with  the  town-folk. 

Yet  he  told  not  all — he  kept  hidden  the  point 
of  his  story, 

Deftly  enwreathing  it  round  with  excuses  and 
far-fancied  reasons 

"Why  he  suddenly  stopped  one  day  at  New 
Salem  and  hung  out  his  shingle. 

Business  he  won  and  its  prize — and  still  he 
proclaimed  himself  loser ; 

Everybody  suspected  the  cause,  though  keep- 
ing it  ,silent, 

Lest  if,  but  breathed,  it  might  swell  up  the 
wind  to  a  prairial  cyclone. 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  17 

To  him  stood  talking  the  Squire  of  the  town, 
Ebenezer,  well-rounded 

"With  five  decades  of  dinners  of  hominy,  corn- 
pone,  and  turkey. 

Days  of  youth  he  had  seen  in  Kentucky,  that 
lucky  Kentucky 

Eloquent  ever  through  lips  of  her  men  and 
looks  of  her  women. 

Now  he  was  judge  of  the  township,  the  even 
dispenser  of  justice 

Unto  the  people,  who  never  disputed  his  law 
or  his  judgment. 

Weighing  his  words  in  the  scales  of  his  of- 
fice, the  Squire  responded: 


"Nay,  I  cannot  agree  with  you  there,  if  you 

please,  my  good  Doctor ; 
You  have  given  one  side  of  the  case,  you  being 

the  plaintiff. 
Hear  now  the  other  which  Justice  demands 

should  not  be  forgotten, 
Let  me,  though  I  be  judge,  state  the  side  of 

the  voiceless  defendant." 
But  the  Doctor  could  hardly  be  stayed  in  his 

argument's  flood-tide, 
He  uprose  from  the  store-box  and  stressed 

his  speech  with  his  gestures : 


18     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 

".Well  I  remember  the  day  I  arrived — the 
town  and  the  country 

Had    assembled    and  perched  on    the    bluff 
overlooking  the  river; 

Up  the  full  channel  came  puffing  in  labor  tri- 
umphant a  steamboat 

Named  the  Talisman,  which  in  the  folds  of 
its  vaporous  magic 

Played  before  every  eye  on  the  hilltop  the 
phantom  colossal 

Of  a  great  city  here  destined  to  rise  on  this 
river. 

Lofty  a  Capitol  grew  in  the  clouds  with  its 
dome  and  its  columns, 

First  embracing  the  town  and  the   county 
within  its  small  circuit, 

Which  kept  widening,  widening,  till  the  whole 
State  it  had  rounded, 

Then  beyond  and  beyond,  when  at  last  it  en- 
circled the  Nation, 

While  the  Sangamon  swelled  to  the  roar  of 
the  huge  Mississippi, 

Bearing  aloft  on  its  bosom  a  spectral  fleet 
to  the  Ocean. 

Such  was  that  Talisman,  Father  of  Lies,  in 

the  form  of  a  steamboat, 
Foaming  up  stream  and  dancing  delusion  be- 
fore all  the  people. 

Lincoln  was  pilot,  plying  its  paddle  against 
the  high  waters, 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  19 

Him  too  magnified  bravely  that  magical  Tal- 
isman's witch-work 

Throwing  his  shadow  up  to  the  Capitol  build- 
ed  in  cloudland, 

Till  he  rose  to  be  pilot  supreme  of  the  storm- 
girt  welkin, 

High  overarching  us  all  to  the  bound  of  the 
farthest  horizon. 

That  was  a  specter  at  which  the  whole  peo- 
ple ran  mad  with  delusion, 

Riotous  fantasy  suddenly  routed  and  captived 
man's  reason, 

And  some  still  feel  the  spell  of  that  ghost 
in  our  sinking  New  Salem." 


Then  the  Doctor  would  snort  a  contemptuous 
sniff  through  the  nostrils, 

Jealous,  twice  jealous  he  was  of  the  tall 
young  man  of  the  people, 

For  between  them  rivalry  rose  for  the  vil- 
lage's honors 

All  of  which  focused  to  fire  in  the  glance  of 
a  beautiful  maiden. 


Forceful  shot  the  retort  of  the  Squire,  the 

just  Ebenezer, 
Passionate  friend   of  the   townsmen's  hero, 

Abraham  Lincoln: 


20    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 

"Aye,  that  pilot  we  soon  are  intending  to 
start  for  Vandalia — 

Capital  now  of  the  State,  and  yet  but  a  step 
in  the  ascent — 

That  he  may  rise  with  the  years  to  the  stat- 
ure which  we  have  dreamed  him. 

Candidate  he  has  been  named  for  making  the 
laws  of  the  people ; 

Soon  the  election  comes  off — and  you  must 
vote  for  him,  Doctor." 


But  disdain  gave  a  twitch  to  the  lips  of  Doc- 
tor Palmetto, 

Aristocratic  disdain  for  Lincoln,  the  popular 
fabler, 

Who  already  was  famed  for  his  art  in  spin- 
ning a  story, 

And  for  the  wit  of  his  ways  in  winning  the 
love  of  the  people. 

But  another's  love  he  had  won,  and  that  was 
the  trouble — 

That  was  the  point  of  the  poison  which  stung 
in  the  soul  of  the  Doctor. 

Still  he  continued  his  travail  of  chewing  the 
cud  of  his  wormwood, 

In  his  own  pain  he  somehow  could  take  a 
malevolent  pleasure, 

Willing  to  show  all  his  torture  of  heart  by 
jealousy's  demon, 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  21 

Making  himself  unhappy  today  by  memories 
bitter. 

So  he  spoke  up  again,  while  circling  the  glo- 
bular Squire  there 

On  the  pine-box  reclining  at  peace  with  him- 
self and  the  world,  too: 


"  Never  since  then  has  a  steamboat  been  seen 
here — never ! 

Rapidly  that  one  had  to  retreat  when  the  wa- 
ters receded. 

With  it  has  vanished  the  air-built  Capitol 
lofty  of  cloudland, 

Which  then  seemed  on  the  point  of  dropping 
to  earth  at  New  Salem. 

Do  you  know  the  sight  of  that  boat  was  my 
future  undoing? 

'Twas  the  illusion  which  charmed  me  to  stay 
in  this  dolorous  village." 


Here  he  took  off  his  hat  and  thrust  it,  re- 
peating his  statement, 

Down  on  the  pine-box  till  it  was  broken  to 
creases  not  to  be  smoothed  out, 

While  the  face  of  the  Squire  had  put  on  a 
quizzical  silence, 

As  if  secretly  doubting,  in  spite  of  the  em- 
phasis double, 


22     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 

For  Ebenezer  often  had  heard  of  a  contrary 
story. 

Then  replacing  his  hat,  the  upstrung  Doc- 
tor continued: 


' '  I  had  just  come  from  a  bit  of  a  town  by  the 
Michigan  lakeside, 

Eager  to  win  the  topmost  prize  in  life's  lot- 
tery regnant, 

And  I  chose  for  my  fate  New  Salem  instead 
of  Chicago!'* 

Whereat  he  toned  down  his  nerves  in  a  taci- 
turn stride  round  the  store-box, 

For  there  throbbed  in  his  heart  the  true  mo- 
tive for  his  selection, 

Which  he  would  never  let  out,  although  it 
were  couched  on  his  tongue-tip. 

Soon  he  returned  to  his  words,  still  ensconc- 
ing his  thoughts  in  his  bosom : 


"Both  towns  then  were  the  same  in  size  with 

similar  outlook, 
But  see  their  difference  now  in  grappling 

scythed  Time  by  the  forelock, 
And  in  outspeeding  the  slash  of  his  weapon, 

the  doom  of  the  mortal ! 
But  that  Talisman  lured  me  to  choosing  the 

dwarf  instead  of  the  giant, 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  23 

Dazzling  my  fantasy  into  a  cataract  golden  of 

fortune 
Which  fell  pouring  its  treasure  out  of  the 

future  down  on  my  pathway. 
Hope  herself  I  dreamed  I  saw  perched  on 

the  top  of  this  hillock, 
Giving  me  many  a  courteous  smile  as  if  she 

would  woo  me : 
But  the  prize  of  my  life  I  have  lost,  e'en  if 

I  go  elsewhere, 
Never  I  can  it  recover — that  upspring  of 

heart  I  once  felt  here." 


So  the  Doctor  complained,   diagnosing  the 

case  of  New  Salem, 
Fallen  out  with  himself  and  the  world,  he 

told  his  own  ailment, 
All  the  pain  of  his  town  and  his  time  in  tone 

he  reflected, 
While  a  personal  tinge  would  color  each  word 

of  his  censure, 
And  underneath  disappointment  outspoken 

lay  something  unspoken; 
Blaming  the  Talisman    blameless,    he    only 

could  blame  what  himself  was. 
From  the  hot-blooded  South  he  had  come 

where  thrives  the  Palmetto 
Stamping  itself  on  the  State  of  his  birth  as 

a  seal  with  its  symbol; 


24    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 

Bitterly  he  was  the  hater  of  President  An- 
drew Jackson, 

In  the  Jacksonian  town  of  good  democratic 
New  Salem, 

Valiant,  vociferous  hater,.armed  to  the  teeth 
for  a  word-war, 

Hence  the  citizens  laughingly  labeled  him 
Doctor  Palmetto, 

Loyal  son  of  the  State  defying  Old  Hickory's 
power. 


Won  all  the  lore  of  his  medical  calling,  his 
way  he  turned  westward, 

Flinging  his  future  into  the  flow  of  the  peo- 
ple's migration 

To  the  wide  "West  in  the  North,  where  dawned 
the  new  Nation. 

He  was  the  one  only  man  in  the  township  who 
could  read  Latin, 

Which  in  odd  bits  of  old  Virgil  he  pompously 
mouthed  to  the  rustics, 

Oft  in  response  to  Jack  Kelso,  the  town's 
Shakespearean  spouter, 

When  he  declaimed  to  the  crowd  at  the  cor- 
ner the  bad  dream  of  Gloster. 

But  again  the  just  Squire  made  ready  to  an- 
swer the  Doctor, 

Balancing  nicely  the  right  on  the  edge  of  his 
tongiie  as  a  knife-blade, 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  25 

Telling  him  not  to  impute  his  own  fault  to 

the  fault  of  the  village, 
And  to  see  in  himself  the  malady  which  he 

complained  of. 

But  the  Doctor  upsprang  as  soon  as  the  sen- 
tence was  spoken, 
Cutting  the  air  with  forefinger  pointed  in 

throes  of  excitement, 
Quite  foreclosing  the  lips  of  the  Squire  with 

passionate  outburst, 
For  he  felt  Ebenezer's  sly  thrust  to  the  seat 

of  his  temper. 
Thus  at  his  country  he  hurled  in  a  breath 

his  thunderbolt  final : 


"I  believe  not  only  this  town  is  going  to 

pieces, 
Aye  this  Nation  is  breaking  up  into  the  units 

that  made  it, 
Those  original  States  first  joined  will  dissolve 

next  this  Union." 


Such  was  his  thrust  at  the  Squire  who  had 
pricked  down  into  his  heart's  sore, 

Which,  unconfessed,  turned  all  of  his  words 
to  a  poignant  confession. 

So  with  his  woes  he  flooded  the  world  from 
his  perch  at  New  Salem, 


26    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 

Spreading  them  over  the  land  to  the  White- 
house  in  Washington  City, 

Reading  himself  disappointed  into  the  fate 
of  his  country. 


Scarce  outspoken  had  been  the  vibrant  tones 
of  the  Doctor, 

When  a  neighboring  farmer  drove  up  to  the 
store  with  his  wagon, 

Catching  on  time  the  last  fleet  words  of  the 
passionate  speaker. 

One  of  the  wheels  was  untired  and  broken, 
another  was  shaky ; 

While  the  old  wain-bed  crazily  lopped  and  the 
harness  was  cranky. 

Excellent  man  was  this  farmer,  yet  bearing 
the  stamp  of  the  border, 

Born  pioneer  and  bred,  and  so  were  his  fath- 
ers before  him. 

Long  they  had  stood  on  the  line  dividing  the 
red  and  the  white  man; 

Where  that  line  would  advance,  the  True- 
bloods  also  advanced  there, 

Taking  unbidden  their  place  to  the  fore  of 
the  marching  frontiersmen. 

Uncle  George  he  was  called,  in  full  George 
Washington  Trueblood. 

Telling  his  little  misfortune,  he  snapped  the 
thread  of  discussion : 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  27 

"I  was  bringing  to  town  some  truck,  some 

potatoes  and  pumpkins, 
Suddenly  down  went  my  wagon,  and  tossed 

me  into  a  puddle, 
Now  I  am  rolling  around  on  three  wheels,  and 

instead  of  the  fourth  one 
See  this  pole  of  a  hickory  sapling  which  holds 

up  the  axle. 
It  was  Lincoln  who  came  to  me  helping  me 

out  of  my  trouble ; 
Somehow  the  tire  quit  the  wheel,  refusing  to 

bind  it  together, 
One  of  the  feloes  slipped  off  from  the  spokes 

and  left  a  big  gap  there, 
So  that  no  rim  ran  round  to  fasten  the  rest 

of  the  feloes ; 
Then  I  picked  up  the  pieces  and  brought  them 

along  in  my  wain-bed. 
But  that  Lincoln  I  like  whose  knack  is  to  come 

at  the  right  time, 
Helpful  he  sprang  to  my  aid  from  under  the 

mulberry  shade-tree 

Where  on  his  bench  he  was  sitting  and  talk- 
ing to  lovely  Ann  Rutledge, 
Who  then  shot  down  the  path  to  the  Lady 

Eulalia  Lovelace. 
Soon  my  load  of  eatable  truck  we  piled  by 

the  roadside, 
Hiding  it  under  a  cover  of  leaves  and  of 

brambles  we  gathered; 


28    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 

It  I  hope  still  to  market  to  you,  if  the  hogs 
do  not  get  it. 

But  this  wagon  I  have  to  restore  to  a  run- 
ning condition, 

And  I  now  scheme  to  make  stronger  than 
ever  my  wheel  from  its  fragments. ' ' 


So  the  brave  man  would  mend  each  rent  in 

the  garment  of  living, 
And  at  the  same  time  thriftily  show  the  mind 

of  the  farmer. 


See  the  Doctor  turn  cloudy  with  streaks  of 

rubicund  lightning 

Flashing  over  his  face  at  the  praises  of  Abra- 
ham Lincoln. 
Deeper  still  stirred  him  the  news  of  that 

couple  conversing  together 
Under  the  mulberry  tree,  the  resort  of  the 

village's  lovers. 
But  he  kept  his  hot  heartburn  unworded  in 

spite  of  its  torture, 
Though  a  venomous  sarcasm  coiled  on  his 

lips  for  a  moment, 
Still  he  suppressed  it  in  pride  and  feelingly 

spoke  to  the  farmer: 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  29 

"Bad  is  your  luck  today  in  this  turn  of  the 

wheel,  Uncle  Georgie, 
"Wheel  of  misfortune  is  yours  and  the  world's 

and  ever  keeps  whirling — 
But  it  is  common — common  to  you  and  to 

me  and  to  all  of  us  present," 
Sighed  sympathetic  the  Doctor  for  others, 

yet  for  himself,  too; 


"  Also  my  cart — the  truth  I  confess  you — has 
gone  all  to  pieces, 

And  to  the  town  itself  has  been  lost  not  only 
its  tire-ring 

But  the  hub  and  the  spoke  and  the  feloe  of 
wood  are  now  floating — 

Floating,  methinks,  each  part  by  itself  down 
the  Sangamon's  stream-bed 

Into  the  mad  Mississippi  away  to  the  limit- 
less Ocean — 

Aye,  much  else  around  me  I  see  that  is  going 
to  pieces/' 


But  right  then  the  firm  voice  of  the  judge, 
just  Squire  Ebenezer, 

Who  was  calmly  surveying  the  injured  mem- 
ber before  him 

Could  be  heard  with  gravity's  mien  deliver- 
ing judgment: 


30    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  11. 

"  Easily  all  these  parts  can  again  be  made 

whole — and  yet  better — 
By  the  wainwright  William  just  yonder,  with 

help  of  his  blacksmith ; 
Doctors  they  are  of  sick  wheels,  even  able  to 

doctor  the  Doctor." 


But    George    Washington    Trueblood — well 

worthy  his  name  and  his  namesake — 
Pondered  not  only  his  wagon,  but  also  he 

thought  of  his  country ; 
For  as  he  came  he  caught  the  bodeful  retort 

of  Palmetto, 
Patriotic  he  answered  the  sneer  of  the  cynical 

critic : 


"Do  you  know,  as  I  trundled  along,  I  thought 

of  our  Nation 
Holding  together  the  States  like  a  wheel  by 

the  tire  of  the  Union, 
And  I  remembered  your  State  which  struck 

at  the  bond  that  has  bound  us ; 
Some  years  ago  that  was,  but  still  is  working 

the  ferment. ' ' 


Fiery  flushed  the  Doctor,  his  sensitive  spot 
had  been  tingled 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  ^ 

By  the  sudden  sharp  prick  of  a  tongue  like 
the  point  of  a  needle, 

For  he  was  born  underneath  the  shade  of  the 
fan-leafed  Palmetto, 

And  its  image  seemed  still  to  be  blooming 
within  his  hot  bosom 

As  if  planted  amid  the  warm  fens  of  the  Caro- 
line sea-coast. 


But  Ebenezer  the  Squire,  bright  bringer  of 

peace  and  of  justice, 
Saw  wrath  rising  between  the  two  speakers, 

the  Northern  and  Southern, 
And  foreboding  a  war  already  between  the 

two  sections, 
Sprang  right  into  the  middle  with  words  of 

mild  mediation, 
Yet  the  strong  lines  of  his  visage  gave  them 

the  force  of  a  judgment : 


"Come  now,  let  us  go  down  to  the  shop  of 

William  the  wainwright 
Who  can  adjust  so  nicely  the  hub  and  the 

spoke  and  the  feloe, 
That  they  all  turn  together  as  one  whenever 

the  wheel  whirls. 
There  we  shall  watch  too  the  tire  fresh-forged 

and  new-banded  of  iron — 


32 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 


Iron  which  grapples  the  rotating  members 

in  grip  adamantine, 
Bringing  obedience  unto  the  law  like  the  roll 

of  the  planets. 
Lincoln  I  think  will  be  there,  the  big  sledge 

he  oft  wields  for  the  blacksmith, 
Circling  his  ponderous  stroke  on  the  anvil 

with  swing  of  his  arm's  length, 
As  did  once  the  old  Titan,  whose  fable  I  read 

in  my  Plutarch. 
Possibly  too  a  speech  he  will  make  us,  and 

tell  a  new  story, 
Or  a  romance  he  may  spin  of  adventure  in 

war  against  Black  Hawk- 
Candidate  popular  soon  to  be  sent  to  the  next 

Legislature." 


But  the  Doctor  failed  not  to  spray  out  some 

jets  of  his  gall-tongue, 
Antipathetic  he  was  to  the  people 's  own  hero, 

tall  Lincoln, 
Who  overtowered  him  far  in  stature  as  well 

as  in  temper, 
Smaller  the  talent  he  owned,  although  his 

learning  was  greater. 
Rumor  too  whispered  around  in  the  village 

that  he  was  jealous, 
And   was   looking    at   men    and    the  world 

through  love  disappointed. 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  33 

* '  Only  two  days  ago  I  was  called  to  prescribe 
for  James  Butledge," 

So  the  Doctor  began,  intoning  his  utterance 
blandly, 

"Who  had  been  shaking  with  chills  of  bene- 
ficent Sangamon's  ague; 

There  I  noticed  fair  Ann,  his  daughter,  the 
village 's  flower, 

But  not  so  blooming  as  when  I  beheld  her 
the  day  I  arrived  here, 

Nor  so  buoyant  as  when  she  engirdled  the 
sword  around  Lincoln, 

Loftiest,  lankest  Captain  of  words  in  the  war 
against  Black  Hawk. 

Absent-minded  she  seemed,  with  warring 
lines  in  her  visage, 

Spare  of  her  eyes  and  stinted  of  smiles  was 
the  mien  of  the  maiden, 

She  who  once  was  so  lively  and  lovely  in  cour- 
teous presence. 

It  is  said  her  betrothed,  for  a  year  now  gone 
on  a  journey, 

Never  has  written  her  where  he  may  be  or 
what  he  is  doing. ' ' 

Then  the  Doctor  uprose  from  the  pine-box 
and  peered  through  the  doorway : 

"Look  at  this  store  paralytic,  once  leaping 
with  life  in  its  business, 

Store  of  Abner  the  absent,  'tis  sick  of  con- 
sumptive New  Salem; 


34     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  11. 

Many  declare  he  has  quit,  forgetful  of  prom- 
ise, or  jealous, 

It  is  added  that  she  has  been  shining  her 
favor  on  Lincoln 

From  the  moment  she  clasped  to  his  waist 
that  sword-belt  ancestral — 

He  too  with  many  an  artful  device  is  thrum- 
ming her  heart-strings ; 

She  is  not  happy,  I  doubt  she  be  healthy,  filled 
with  some  soul-strife. 

Introverted  was  often  her  look  as  if  in  a 
struggle, 

Watching  with  sympathy  double  both  sides 
of  herself  in  a  battle. " 


So  the  shrewd  Doctor  tongued  on  in  his  bent, 
forecasting  diseases, 

Giving  a  glimpse  of  himself  as  he  dwelt  on 
the  troubles  of  others, 

Quite  unable  to  quell  into  silence  the  fury  pro- 
phetic. 

Then  they  all  looked  down  to  the  road  of  the 

Sangamon  bottom, 
Seeing  a  line  of  white-covered  wagons  one 

after  the  other, 
As  they  threaded  the  flats  and  bended  the 

bridge  of  the  river. 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  35 

"See  yonder,"  the  Doctor  broke  in,  "the 

great  stream  of  migration 
Surges  ahead  to  the  broad  Mississippi  and 

possibly  farther, 
Turning  aside  from  our  place  with  a  scoff, 

not  deigning  to  tarry 
Where  no  hope  can  be  seen  on  the  hill-top, 

bidding  them  hither." 


While  the  last  word  of  the  Doctor  was  pulsing 
its  tune  on  the  air-waves, 

Suddenly  sounded  the  clang  of  the  bell  from 
the  knoll  of  the  school-house, 

In  a  kind  of  response,  dingdonging  the  speech 
of  the  speaker, 

With  a  call  to  each  child  of  the  town  to  pre- 
pare for  the  future, 

And  to  each  man  of  the  town  to  keep  himself 
young  with  new  knowledge. 

When  the  Squire  had  heard  the  last  echo 
whispering  silence, 

Breathing  its  ghost  tintinnabular  into  the 
sigh  of  the  breezes, 

He  peered  over  the  valley  afar  and  reflective- 
ly added : 

"Think!  in  their  skull-pans  uncombed  those 
people  are  bearing  the  New  World, 

Going  forward  to  some  young  settlement,  then 
again  forward, 


36    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  II. 

Ever  creating  afresh  their  free  institutional 
order, 

Somehow  driven  by  impulse  to  girdle  the 
earth  with  migration 

From  the  far-off  aforetime,  bridging  the  past 
to  the  present 

In  a  long-linked  chain  made  of  towns  whose 
soul  is  their  communal  freedom. 

Thus  I  came  from  Kentucky,  my  father  thus 
came  from  Virginia; 

Still  I  remember  the  passage  over  the  rough 
Alleghenies, 

And  again  I  may  start" — here  he  stopped  the 
push  of  his  discourse, 

Lest  he  might  seem  to  relapse  to  the  queru- 
lous mood  of  the  Doctor. 

Then  with  a  jolly  round  guffaw  to  which  his 
abdomen  laughed  echoes, 

Up  he  sprang  from  the  store-box,  shaking 
with  life's  satisfaction, 

As  he  lipped  in  good- will  strong  words  which 
meant  a  decision: 

"  'Tis  enough !  let  us  haste  to  the  shop  of  Wil- 
liam the  wainwright 

Who  has  a  turn  for  splicing  what's  parted  in 
man  or  in  matter, 

And  can  feel  in  each  stroke  of  his  work  the 
beat  of  the  world's  soul. 

Noble  artisan  is  he,  hating  disease  and  divi- 
sion, 


DOCTOR  AND  SQUIRE.  37 

Be  it  shown  in  the  wheel  of  a  wagon  or  mind 

of  a  mortal." 
Snapping  his  words  the  Doctor  muttered  an 

answer  disdainful: 

"I  do  not  like  him  at  all — that  mad-eyed  me- 
chanic and  dreamer 
Calling  his  shop  in  conceit  philosophy's  home 

at  New  Salem ; 
Leave  me  alone  here — nor  can  I  abide  the 

demagogue  Lincoln, 
Leader  you  praise  him — misleader  I  damn 

him  with  all  his  flattering  fables, 
Tattered  clown  to  the  tatterdemalions,  their 

sycophant  silly." 


100k 


Wainwright  and  Blacksmith. 

Leisurely  down  the  street  from  the  store 

strolled  Squire  Ebenezer, 
Quite     untuned     at     hearing     his     friends 

besmirched  by  the  Doctor — 
Aye  his  two  best  friends  and  the  two  best 

men  of  the  village — 
So  he  mused  to  himself  about  Lincoln  and 

William  the  wainwright. 


Following  close  at  his  side  the  sun-tanned 

tiller  was  driving 
His  laborious  team  whose  muscular  bodies 

slow- stepping 
Ever  were  ready  to  play  out  a  hearty  full 

pull  at  each  mud-hole. 

(38) 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  39 

On  the  rickety  rim  of  his  wayward  wagon 

now  balanced 
Farmer     George     Washington     Trueblood 

turned  and  addressed  his  companion: 
"Yes,   our  Doctor  is  making  his   days   all 

curdle  to  clabber 
From  the  sweet  milk  which  Time,  the  old 

cow,  lets  drip  from  her  udder. 
On  his  lips  and  his  looks  he  dolefully  wears 

a  sour  stomach, 
Life  is  a  little  too  much  for  him  here  in  our 

little  New  Salem, 
It  were  better  he  should  before  night  set  out 

for  Chicago. 
Talent  is  his,  but  more  highly  esteemed  by 

himself  than  by  others ; 
Learning  he  has  too,  and  shows  it,  as  when 

to  us  boors  he  talks  Latin, 
But  if  I  dare  diagnose  the  Doctor  himself 

diagnosing, 

In  his  heart  turns  acid  a  droplet  of  love  dis- 
appointed ; 
Best  of  the  medicines  which  he  can  take  is  to 

flee  to  Chicago." 


Slowly  weighing  his  words  Ebenezer  gave 

his  decision: 
'  Champion  fault-finder  always  the  Doctor 

has  been — he  was  born  so — 


40  LINCOLN   AND   ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK   III. 

Childhood's   balsamy   breath,   methinks,   he 

drew  discontented, 
Eeared  in  the  shadow  disdainfully  cast  by 

the  haughty  Palmetto — 
The  dissatisfied  tree  and  blaming  the  rest  of 

the  forest. 
Then  his  profession  is  lure  to  hunt  out  the 

malady  hidden 
Till  he  loves  the  pursuit  of  disease  and  loves 

the  disease  too ; 
Keen  espial  of  ill  turns  character,  yea  his 

religion." 


Thus  one  side  of  the  case  the  Squire  had 

rightfully  set  forth, 
But  on  the  other  side  also  he  spoke  a  fair 

word,  as  his  wont  was — 
Since  he  could  not  help  pleading  for  plaintiff 

as  well  as  defendant : 
''Still  I  confess  the  critical  speech  of  the 

Doctor  is  true  too, 
As  the  medicine  always  is  bitter,  e'en  if  it 

cure  you; 
No  puffing  Talisman  ever  will  creep  up  again 

through  the  channel 
Flushed   by   yon    Sangamon    streamlet,    so 

shrunk  is  it  now  to  our  vision; 
That  fair  dream  has  flitted  far-off  with  the 

treacherous  steamboat, 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  41 

And  the  canal  is  not  going  to  flow  this  way 
by  our  doorsteps. 

How  the  great  city  we  saw  is  downf  alien  even 
from  cloudland! 

And  our  air-built  Capitol's  dome  with  its  col- 
umns of  marble 

Seems  to  be  sportively  waltzing  away  from 
us  on  the  horizon, 

Circling  around  northeast  as  if  ready  to 
settle  at  Springfield, 

While  we  now  have  to  sweat  to  keep  anchored 
to  earth  our  few  cabins." 


Then  the  Squire  secretively  muffled  his  voice 

for  a  moment 
As  if  unwilling  to  hear  the  words  he  was 

going  to  utter: 
"List,  I  feel  in  New  Salem  herself  the  sly 

throb  of  an  impulse 
Growing  the  wings  of  migration  once  more 

for  a  flight  to  the  westward; 
Still  not  dead  are  we  yet,  though  unwell  as 

the  Doctor  declares  us — 
Only  a  Sangamon  ague" — the  Squire  was 

suddenly  silent, 
For  he  heard  two  strokes  of  the  resonant  clap 

of  the  school-bell 
Calling  the  time  of  the  day  from  its  belfry 

to  gather  the  children, 


42  LINCOLN   AND   ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK   III. 

While  his  bosom  beat  loud  in  response  to  its 

musical  air-waves, 
Which  then  echoed  his  deed  in  helping  the 

folk  of  the  future 
That  they  possess  their  ancestral  estate  of 

man-building  knowledge. 
But  the  farmer,  mindless  of  mishap,  broke 

out  in  a  rapture, 
As  there  fell  on  his  ear  the  sounds  from  the 

shop  of  the  wainwright : 


"How  all  roads  of  this  country  are  lining 

just  into  one  center! 
That  is  the  magnet  now  turning  to  hope  each 

lift  of  the  footstep. 
Here  is  the  shop  of  the  wainwright,  whose 

heart  seems  the  heart  of  this  village; 
As  I  look  over  the  land,  the  highways  are 

forming  a  network 
Like  the  outspreading  spokes  of  a  hub — that 

hub  is  this  workshop, 
Where  is  the  home  of  the  wheel,  the  racer 

and  bearer  of  burdens. 
What  an  upspring  I  take  in  leaving  the  look 

of  the  Doctor! 
Somehow  I  feel  as  if  I  am  passing  from 

ailing  to  healing. 

Tell  me,  why  is  it  I  enter  a  presence  renew- 
ing, whole-making? 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  43 

And  a  welcome  within  me  I  hear  to  the  weal 
of  this  workshop  ? 

Now  I  can  draw  a  fresh  thought  that  is  sent 
from  the  soul  of  all  being, 

And  I  feel  all  misfortune,  suffering,  death  to 
be  part  in  my  wholeness." 

Even  a  breath  in  sign  of  relief  he  suggest- 
ively puffed  forth. 


Then  replied  Ebenezer,  the  cool,  to  the  out- 
burst rhapsodic: 

"Yes,  the  people  throng  hither  from  over 
the  bound  of  the  township, 

Prom  the  circumference  streaming  along  each 
road  to  the  center, 

Loving  the  workshop,  loving  the  workman, 
old  William  the  wainwright, 

For  the  excellent  handicraft  which  is  the 
pride  of  his  spirit, 

Eager  to  gaze  at  the  musical  strokes  of  the 
whirl  of  his  fore-arm, 

As  he  tunes  into  form  with  his  tools  the  re- 
fractory oakwood, 

Quite  as  if  singing  a  strain  of  the  secret  of 
Nature  by  motion, 

Which  seems  able  to  utter  such  thoughts  far 
better  than  words  can. ' ' 


44  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  III. 

Both  of  the  visitors  gazed  at  that  picture  of 

new  revelation, 
And  they  hearkened  elate  the  harmonious  hit 

of  the  hammer, 
Which  kept  time  in  the  heart  along  with  the 

bulge  of  the  biceps. 


But  the  Squire  looked  up  at  a  log  in  the  wall 

of  the  workshop : 
"Do  you  know,"  he  musingly  spoke,  "it  was 

I  who  cut  down  these — timbers, 
Rolling  them  up  to  the  site  of  this  shop  by 

the  help  of  the  handspike! 
Thus  the  first  seven  log-cabins  were  built  with 

floors  made  of  puncheons, 
Then  we  dammed  up  the  river  in  summer, 

erecting  the  gristmill. 
That  was  the  birth  of  the  infant  New  Salem 

— scant  five  years  old  now — 
But  in  a  day  it  seemed  born  and  full-grown, 

as  if  planted  from  heaven ; 
Leaped  up  the  shop  and  the  store  with  the 

round  red  school-house  as  center, 
And  the  best  bell  I  could  find  in  St.  Louis  I 

bought  for  its  belfry, 
Sweetly  calling  each  child  of  the  village  to 

come  to  its  lesson. 
That  the  first  duty  I  deemed,  the  schooling  of 

all  of  our  children. 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  45 

Soon  the  increase  of  people  ran  up  with  the 

coming  of  babies, 
So    we    have    young    George    Washingtons 

growing  along  with  you  old  ones, 
Jeffersons    many    come    bouncing    to    light 

among  us  Virginians, 
Several  Andrew  Jacksons  have  lately  arrived 

to  abide  here, 
Lustily  feeling  at  home  in  good  democratic 

New  Salem. 
So  we  still  keep  alive  our  great  men  reborn 

on  the  border. 
See!     This  log  I  remember — the  adze  slid 

from  it  and  cut  me. ' ' 


There  the  Squire  hit  a  beam  with  his  cane 

as  they  stood  at  the  doorway, 
And    he    showed    proudly    the    scar    once 

stamped  as  a  seal  on  his  body. 
Then  he  spoke  out  more  freely,  delighting  to 

hear  his  own  accents : 
"Do  you  know,  Uncle  George,  I  would  like 

to  do  all  of  it  over — 
Build  another  community,  also  set  it  to  run- 

t  ning, 
Till  it  would  march  of  itself  on  the  road  I 

had  made  to  the  future; 
Some  such  passion  lurks  in  me,  again  it  may 

rise  to  the  surface." 


46  LINCOLN  AND   ANN   RUTLEDOE—BOOK   III. 

As  the  twain  trod  over  the  sill,  they  were 

smit  with  a  wonder; 
Silent  they  stood  in  a  spell  that  bound  for  a 

minute  their  footing, 
And  untongued  them  totally,  viewing  with 

vision  voiceless 
Sunrise  in  an  old  man  whose  face  overflowed 

with  his  radiance, 
Plowed  in  luminous  furrows  and  sown  with 

the  light  of  his  soul-world. 
Raying  a  wreath  of  gray  hair  which  bristled 

with  sunbeams  his  forehead 
He  would  shake  out  his  heart  in  the  shock  of 

each  laboring  hand-stroke 
While  his  eye  scintillant  of  soul  would  shoot 

forth  its  sparkles, 
Flamed  with  the  cosmical  thought  of  creation 

unwordable  ever; 
Radiant  every  act  was  of  love,  of  love  the 

All-maker. 


He  was  so  sunk  in  his  work  that  he  hardly 

looked  up  at  the  comers: 
This  was  William  the  wainwright,  making 

the  wheel  of  a  wagon. 
Into  the  hub  the  stiff  spokes  had  already 

been  cunningly  fitted, 
Each   jagged   out   by  itself   and   thrust   in 

another  direction 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITff.  47 

Off  from  the  rest  of  its  mates,  repellent  it 
seemed  of  its  kindred, 

All  in  a  flight  from  themselves  and  the  center 
from  which  they  had  started, 

Somehow  striving  to  shun  in  a  scorn  society's 
order, 

Fiercely  refusing  to  join  in  the  task  of  co- 
operation. 

Each  individual  spoke  of  the  hub  shot  defi- 
antly outwards 

Seeking  the  rim  of  all  space,  but  finding  the 
zero  eternal. 


Mark  now  the  wainwright  becoming  a  look 

of  affection  enfeatured, 
As  he  joins  them  around  in  a  circle  with  mal- 
let and  wimble, 
Fitting  the  feloes  into  a  ring  which  clasps 

them  together, 
Shaping  to  one  all  the  parts  which  hated 

before,  and  divided. 
How  he  loved  his  vocation  as  godlike  and 

wrought  in  its  spirit ! 
By  his  labor  he  lived,  still  more  his  labor  he 

lived  for. 
Food  it  brought  to  his  body,  food  it  gave  to 

his  soul  too; 
Making  the  wheel  of  a  wagon,  the  world  he 

seemed  to  be  making. 


48  LINCOLN  AND   ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK   III. 

In  his  workshop  he  was  himself  the  Creator 's 
own  image, 

And  the  whole  universe  saw  he  rise  rounded 
to  strokes  of  the  Builder, 

Aye  the  big  round  of  the  universe  whirling' 
attuned  to  the  wain- wheel 

While  it  would  whelm  all  space  to  its  sweep 
both  inward  and  outward, 

Cycling  the  aeons  of  future  and  past  to  the 
tap  of  its  timebeat. 

For  the  wainwright  also  was  maker  in  small 
of  creation, 

Which  he  renewed  in  each  piece  of  his  handi- 
work however  little, 

For  he  felt  God  in  the  draw  of  his  saw  and 
the  hit  of  his  hammer, 

Felt  the  pulsation  of  Love  divine  which  uni- 
fies all  things. 


Silent  in  awe  the  visitors  stood  as  if  present 

at  worship, 
Till  the  Squire  at  last  spoke  up  in  words 

sympathetic : 
"You  appear  not  to  notice  us,  thrilled  with 

the  rapture  of  labor, 
As  if  praying  you  might  be  by  work  to  the 

worker  supernal, 
And  you  venerate  what  you  are  doing  just  in 

the  doing, 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  49 

Making  yourself  in  your  deed  the  reverent 

bearer  of  Godhood. 
Into  the  heart  of  your  wheel  your  prayerful 

eye  is  now  gleaming, 
Lifted  to  peer  in  its  glances  behind  the  drawn 

veil  of  all  Nature. ' ' 


Slowly,  almost  unwillingly,  "William  looked 

up  from  his  labor, 
Though  his  hand  still  held  the  keen  tool  in 

the  grip  of  its  cunning, 
As  if  delaying  to  break  the  sweet  bond  of 

some  hidden  communion; 
But  his  speech  was  gentle,  though  tenderly 

trembling  with  age- throbs : 
''Yes  I  try  to  live  out  in  my  life  the  blessed 

old  adage, 
Hymning  it  oft  in  a  tune  to  my  soul :  to  labor 

is  prayer. 
All  my  deeds  are  chanting  aloud  their  orisons 

holy, 
If  you  can  hear  their  intimate  song  in  the 

strokes  of  the  workman. 
Maker  I  am  through  the  Maker  Himself  ful- 
filling His  promise, 
God  the  first  Laborer  is,  Creator  of  all  things 

each  moment; 
For  with  each  moment  the  whole  is  being 

renewed  in  His  workshop. 


50  LINCOLN  AND   ANN  RUTLEDOE—BOOK  III. 

Doing  my  own  little  task  I  pattern  me  after 
the  Master, 

Making  this  wheel  to-day  I  share  in  the  act  of 
creation, 

Realizing  a  model  divine  which  I  bear  in  my 
bosom, 

Through  the  toil  of  my  hand  I  utter  my  fer- 
vent petition." 


Pointing  his  look  at  a  flower  that  eyed  him 

with  blooms  at  his  window, 
Like  so  many  sweet  glances  of  love  for  his 

age's  renewal, 
And  then  rolling  his  vision  skyward,  spake 

William  the  wainwright: 
"See  this  cowslip — it  is  a  wheel — and  a  per- 
fect wheel-maker — 
Bounding  and  ever  repeating  its  hub  and  its 

spoke  and  its  feloe, 
And  even  painting  its  parts  in  a  green  and  a 

white  and  a  golden, 
So  it  applauds  me  with  glances  of  hope  and 

woos  me  to  work  well, 
Often  recalling  a  flowery  love  which  from 

me  once  vanished. 
Is  not  the  earth  too  a  wheel,  revolving  around 

on  its  axis, 
As  it  rolls  on  its  sky-made  road  encircling 

the  sun  with  its  girdle! 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  5^ 

Even  the  cosmieal  wheel  I  have  glimpsed  in 

a  moment  supernal, 
Eimmed  with  the  galaxy  starry  and  bowling 

the  universe  Godward." 
So  his  spirit  took  voice  in  a  rapture  of  lofty 

communion 
With  some  inner  experience  not  understood 

by  the  others. 


But  to  the  glow  of  the  wainwright  responded 

the  cool  Ebenezer: 
"Let  us  come  back  to  our  earth  here,  speckled 

with  little  New  Salem, 
Which  cannot  use  your  big  wheels  of  the 

globe  or  the  sun  or  the  cosmos. 
Be  it  yours  to  connect  us  with  neighboring 

towns  and  their  peoples 
By  your  handicraft  subtle  here  shown  in  this 

rotary  wood-work, 
Which  will  bear  us  around  on  the  earth  till 

we  mount  to  the  firmament  stellar, 
Since  the  Sangamon  sullen  has  failed  us,  yea 

the  canal  too." 


Thus  was  William's  fair  dreamland  drenched 
with  the  prose  of  the  present. 

But  unquenched  in  his  ecstacy  spake  he,  fore- 
casting the  future : 


52  LINCOLN  AND   ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  III. 

"Listen!  a  greater  than  mine  is  soon  coming 

—far  greater,  far  stronger— 
Tis  a  wheel  I  still  mean — I  see  it  now  roll  on 

the  prairie, 
Not  made  of  wood  like  this  one  of  mine  so 

light  and  so  slender, 
Bearing  a  burden  more  heavy  and  circling 

its  axle  more  swiftly, 
Eoaring  it  runs,  fire-breathing  its  nostrils, 

the  dragon  of  fable 
Is  to  be  harnessed  for  work,  aye  saddled  and 

reined  for  the  rider. 
This  is  my  lot  and  my  hope  and  my  prayer : 

I  shall  be  transcended." 


Look,  the  last  feloe  is  fitted,  the  rim  now 

beveled  and  rounded ; 
Soon  the  wheel  is  released  from  its  block, 

and  caressed  by  the  master, 
Whose  delight  is  perfection  within  the  small 

bounds  of  his  wheelcraft, 
Feeling  the  flawless  All  can  be  put  in  the 

small  of  the  smallest. 
Eolling  his  wheel  roundabout  and  revealing 

its  rotary  virtue 
He  admired  its  blameless  behavior  as  well  as 

its  shape  without  blemish; 
Playful  he  teased  it  as  if  it  might  be  his 

dearest  companion. 


WAINWRIOHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  53 

Then  to  his  action  was  suited  the  word  of 

William  the  wainwright: 
"Now  we  must  trundle  it  over  the  alley  to 

Peter  the  blacksmith, 
Practical  Peter,  my  half  for  completing  my 

work  and  my  soul  too, 
Who  will  hoop  it  with  iron  around  this  rim 

of  the  feloes, 
That  they  be  held  to  their  place  and  their 

task  in  their  circular  union, 
Made  to  withstand  the  stress  and  the  strain 

of  all  coming  disruption. 
He  will  iron  the  hub  too  with  bands  and  rivet 

them  tightly, 
That  the  center  may  yield  not,  whatever  the 

thrust  of  its  lading, 
And  disrupt  not,  however  mighty  the  quake 

of  collision — 
Peter  can  do  it,  my  counterpart,  making  me 

whole  in  my  wheelcraft. 


There  we  may  see  too  the  man  of  the  future, 

young  Abraham  Lincoln, 
Whom  we  purpose  to  send  by  our  votes  to 

Vandalia  law-making. 
Not  unlike  to  wheel-making  is,  to  my  mind, 

the  vocation, 
As  it  builds  to  a  harmony  whole  man's  doings 

discordant, 


54  LINCOLN   AND   ANN   RVTLEDGE—BOOK   III. 

Trying  to  legislate  for  him  the  make  of  the 

cosmical  order, 
For  on  the  Law  the  universe  stamps  itself  as 

the  first  model." 


So  they  all  started  to  rolling  the  wheel  to 

the  shop  of  the  blacksmith, 
Peter,  whose  labor  was  love  but  whose  love 

was  very  laborious, 
When  of  a  sudden  the  farmer  woke  up  with  a 

lapsed  reminiscence : 

"What!  Abe  Lincoln!  I  saw  him  this  morn- 
ing under  the  shade-tree 
As    my    vehicle    broke    with    its    load    and 

splashed  in  a  mud-hole. 
There  he   sat  with  Ann  Rutledge   upon  a 

looped  settle  of  grapevines 
Which  he  once  bent  to  embraces  and  wound 

in  a  seat  for  two  persons; 
For  what  purpose  it  was  I  wondered  until  I 

had  seen  them ; 
Happy  he  looked  in  reading  some  verses,  to 

judge  by  the  jingle ; 
They  did  not  see  me,  so  occupied  were  they 

with  rhymes  and  themselves  too, 
Till  the  crack  of  my  axle  crashed  into  their 

happiest  moment, 
Dragging  them  down  to  the  world  which  was 

clashing  and  swashing  about  them. 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  55 

Ann  sprang  up  with  a  blush  and  sped  off  to 

the  four-pillared  mansion, 
Home  of  that  gracious  soul,  the  Lady  Eulalia 

Lovelace, 
Ready  to  reconcile  troubles  of  heart  for  wife 

and  for  maiden, 
Ever  the  healer  of  wounded  hope  for  all  of 

the  towns-folk. 
Lincoln  had  meanwhile  skipped  to  my  wagon, 

he  took  off  his  hat  too, 
How  he  stammered  his  words,  not  so  fluent 

they  ran  as  his  wont  was : 


'Here  Uncle  George,  is  your  newspaper  which 

you  receive  from  St.  Louis, 
Old  French  town  on  the  river,  unsainted  in 

spite  of  its  saintship, 
Name  of  a  royal  crusader  far  back  in  the 

time  medieval, 
Marching  to  capture  his  heathenish  foe,  he 

himself  was  the  capture — 
Sometimes  I  muse  if  that  city  will  share  in 

the  fate  of  its  patron.' 


Never  before  did  Lincoln  so  wander  when- 
ever I  heard  him, 

Jolt  so  his  words  through  his  windpipe  which 
seemed  a  corduroy  roadbed; 


56    LINCOLN  AND   ANN   RUTLEDGE—BOOK   III. 

Still  he  kept  forcing  his  tones  on  the  air 
though  flushed  all  his  forehead: 

'You  are  aware  I  am  Postmaster  now  of  this 
town  of  New  Salem, 

Mail  I  came  to  deliver,  Miss  Eutledge  ex- 
pected a  letter, 

But  it  did  not  arrive,  I  had  then  to  see  her 
and  tell  her.'  " 


Here  the  old  farmer  knowingly  winked  and 

nudged  Ebenezer 
In  the  broad-belted  midriff,  then  he  went  on 

with  his  prattle : 
'  *  Ended  this  story  so  happily,  what  a  relief  to 

our  Lincoln 
Pumping  his  lungs  for  a  word  which  rose 

from  sources  unwilling ! 
See  now!  the  flow  of  his  speech  jets  up  like 

a  fountain  Artesian: 
'Look  at  this  hat  here,'  said  he,  unwrinkling 

the  stress  of  his  visage 
'Veteran  'tis  of  many  campaigns,  an  office 

it  has  too 
For  its  long  service  in  warfare  of  wear — our 

Postoffice  'tis  now — 

Letters  three  and  newspapers  two,  but  un- 
wrapped, for  I  read  them 
With    each    subscriber's    consent — that    is 

yours,'  and  he  reached  me  my  paper 


WAINWRIOHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  57 

Which  I  skim  with  delight  for  its  praise  of 

my  President  Jackson. 
Then  he  clapped  on  his  long  lank  hair  his 

rickety  head-gear 
With   its    contents,    yet    one   wee   letter   I 

glimpsed  in  his  hurry ; 
No  address  was  on  it  outside,  but  a  heart 

drawn  in  red-ink, 
Deftly  he  tucked  it  in  under  the  rest,  as  if 

trying  to  hide  it ; 
At  his  big  bony  fingers  crooking  so  nimbly  I 

wondered. 
I  was  going  to  quiz  him  but  swiftly  a  word  he 

now  thrust  in 
Just  before  me,  and  whirled  round  my  mind 

on  myself  in  a  moment, 
Saying  right  at  the  point  of  my  trouble  where 

I  was  straitened : 


'Dear  Uncle  George,  I  see  you  have  struck  a 
small  snag  of  misfortune, 

Come,  let  me  prop  up  your  axle  here  sunk  till 
you  get  to  the  wainwright 

Who  can  refit  your  wheel  and  make  it  run 
better  than  ever. 

Mender  he  is  by  nature,  not  only  of  broken- 
down  wagons 

But  of  spirits  sore-breached  in  the  battle  so 
stressful,  distressful, 


58      LINCOLN   AND   ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK   III. 

Which  life  kindles  in  all  who  are  born  in  this 

world's  separation, — 
Which   the   man   wins   by   the   help    of  his 

friends,  but  helping  himself  too.' 


Thus  bespoke  me  in  sympathy's  tones  the 

soft-hearted  Lincoln 
Watchful  of  mishap  befallen  us  mortals  and 

ready  to  stem  it, 
Beaching  us  aid  at  the  pinch  unforeseen,  as 

a  Providence  human. 
So  he  said,  so  he  did;  then  turning  aside  he 

addressed  me: 


'  Now  I  am  off,  but  later  to-day  I  hope  I  may 
see  you, 

When  from  my  hat  I  have  emptied  these 
pieces  of  mail  to  their  owners, 

And  have  got  back  my  tongue  for  telling  the 
people  a  story. 

Let  me  confess  you  my  mind  has  been  plan- 
ning a  speech  of  some  moment, 

This  afternoon  I  am  going  to  give  it  at  Peter 
the  blacksmith's.' 


Off  he  sped  through  the  meadow,  unwilling  to 
drop  me  a  fable, 


WAINWRIGHT  AND  BLACKSMITH.  59 

Though  I  asked  him  to  fit  to  my  case  some 

beast  out  of  Esop. 
Always  had  been  so  chatty  his  wont,  that  a 

moment  I  pondered." 


Thus  the  farmer 's  frank  tongue  kept  flushing 

in  gossipy  freedom, 
While  the  wheel  went  bowling  along  to  the 

shop  of  the  blacksmith — 
Man  of  big  brawn,  most  muscular  arm  of  the 

village,  but  peaceful, 
Yet  in  support  of  the  Law  ever  ready  to  smite 

the  wrong-doer, 
Or  the  public  disturber,  if  Squire  Ebenezer 

should  call  him — 
Never  quite  able  to  wash  from  his  forehead 

the  grime  of  his  workshop, 
Which  would  cling  to  the  roots  of  his  hair 

through  soft  soap  and  water; 
Still  the  massed  might  of  his  fortress  rose 

up  the  tower  of  labor, 
And  unless  he  had  ironed  the  wheel,  it  could 

never  have  run  long 
Crushed  to  earth  in  its  wood-made  members 

with  burden  of  carriage ; 
Aye  the  communal  wheel  he  helped  iron  with 

character  massive. 


60    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  III. 

Peter  the  real,  symmetrical  half  of  William 
the  ideal — 

Friend  of  the  dreamful  wainwright,  but  too 
his  complement  solid, 

Making  him  workable  who  in  his  thought  was 
the  talent  transcendent, 

Fusing  terrestrial  Will  with  Intellect  dwell- 
ing in  Heaven. 


William  had  kept  in  his  heart  and  trans- 
figured an  image  departed 

Yet  eternally  present  within  him  and 
glimpsed  in  his  labor, 

Furnishing  ever  the  fountain  of  Life  with 
Love  the  renewer. 

That  was  the  spirit  the  people  could  see  in 
the  stroke  of  the  workman, 

And  could  hear  in  an  undertone  tender  of 
voice  from  his  soul-world, 

When  he  would  speak  of  the  pain  and  the 
gain  of  all  living  and  dying, 

E'en  sympathetic  with  Death  for  the  sake  of 
Life's  reconstruction, 

Loving  the  loss  of  the  loved  in  the  blessed 
return  of  the  spirit — 

Spirit  absent  in  Time,  but  becoming  Eter- 
nity's presence — 

For  without  Death,  he  would  say  there  never 
can  be  Resurrection. 


Abraham  Lincoln. 

Laughter  in  unison  greeted  the  three  ap- 
proaching the  smithy, 

From  a  roundabout  rout  of  men  encircling 
a  speaker 

"Who  overtopped  them  all  by  the  length  and 
the  strength  of  his  stature, 

Needing  no  platform  to  lift  him  above  the 
yeomen  around  him, 

Who  would  waken  the  clouds  from  their  slum 
berous  dream  in  the  welkin 

With  an  echo  of  joy  as  he  popped  out  the 
point  of  his  story. 

That  was  candidate  Lincoln  electioneering 
the  people 

If  perchance  they  would  send  him  as  law- 
maker down  to  Vandalia, 

(61) 


62  LINCOLN  AND   ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  IV. 

Whence  he  might  start  on  the  trail  that  leads 
from  the  State  to  the  Nation, 

For  at  the  end  of  that  lane  he  could  glimpse 
in  the  distance  the  White  House, 

As  every  lad  of  the  land  could,  declaiming 
the  speeches  of  Webster. 


But  when  the  orator  saw  the  sage  wain- 

wright  slip  up  and  listen 
With  Ebenezer  the  hard-headed  Squire  and 

Trueblood  the  farmer, 
Aye,    George   Washington    Trueblood,    the 

rough-palmed  plowman  of  prairies, 
Who  with  his  practical  sense  united  a  love 

of  the  fable, 
There  was  a  change  in  his  look  attuning  the 

words  of  his  discourse; 
(These  he  deftly  directed  to  tap  a  fresh  note 

on  the  eardrums 
Which  the  new  hearers  were  stretching  to 

throb  in  response  to  the  speaker, 
Who  then  opened  a  fountain  sonorous  that 

welled  from  his  soul's  source, 
As  he  started  to  image  his  world  like  his 

favorite  Esop — 
Him  who  imparted  the  word  to  the  things 

that  Nature  left  wordless: 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 


63 


"Once  on  a  time  the  horse  was  pulling  a 

well-loaded  wagon 
When  from  behind  of  a  sudden  the  wheel 

in  a  fit  began  groaning: 
'Oh  my  hard  lot!  this  burden  to  bear  I  am 

able  no  longer! 
Splinters  soon  I  shall  be,  crushed  under  the 

weight  of  oppression!' 
Then  it  broke  and  it  fell  with  a  crash  and 

a  splash  in  the  mudhole 
Where  it  lay  in  its   ruin  bespattered  and 

mired,"  murmured  Lincoln, 
Touched  to  a  sigh  by  his  own  fellow-feeling 

with  words  of  his  picture. 


Then  he  suddenly    stopped    and    wistfully 

gazed  for  a  moment, 
Over  the  heads  of  the  crowd  in  the  distance : 

at  whom  was  he  gazing? 
Look!  he  is  balking  right  at  the  pivotal  pull 

of  his  discourse, 
All  of  his  glances  seem  kindled  to  love  in 

a  revery  wordless; 
But  he  recovered :  *  *  the  horse  looked  around 

and  neighed  back  reproaches : 
'Weakling  wooden  and  worthless,  shrilling 

the  shriek  of  a  coward! 
Not  to  bravely  upbear  what  I  painfully  pull 

with  my  labor! 


64  LINCOLN   AND   ANN   RUTLED&E—BOOK  IV. 

Still  I  am  glad  of  this  happy  mishap  for  I 

can  rest  now, 
Yea,  I  shall  prance  to  yon  pasture  and  crop 

to  my  fill  its  lush  grasses!' — 
So  the  horse  in  good  luck  was  taunting  his 

neighbor  unlucky, 
When  the  load  was  lifted  and  plumped  on 

his  back  without  mercy. 
See  him  in  turn  fall  down  by  the  side  of 

the  wheel  in  the  mudhole, 
For  the  burden  has  broken  him  too  with  its 

ponderous  treasure, 
"Which  is  now  strewn  in  the  stress  of  the 

owner  along  the  wet  wayside, 
Pumpkins,  potatoes,  and  apples,  fine  food 

for  the  swine  and  for  man  too." 
"That  is  the  fact,  it  all  happened  to  me," 

broke  in  Uncle  Georgie. 
"  Abraham,  let  yourself  out,  and  spin  me 

here  into  a  fable." 


Lincoln  swerved  not  to  reply  but  gleamed 
as  if  probing  the  center, 

That  he  might  bring  to  the  surface  the  in- 
nermost sense  of  his  story: 

"That  old  wheel  of  the  ages  lies  shattered, 
e'en  should  it  be  mended, 

To  the  thrust  of  the  time  no  longer  it  shows 
itself  equal; 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN.  ($5 

And  that  horse  too  is  fallen  beneath  the 

fresh  pull  of  our  epoch, 
Wagon  and  wheel  and  horse  must  win  a  new 

soul  with  its  body, 
Spirits,  methinks  I  can  see  them,  awaiting 

a  grand  transformation, 
Aged,  decrepit  in  shape,  but  in  throes  of  a 

youthful  renewal —  j 

Even  unreasoning  things  must  have  too  a 

regeneration. ' ' 


Here  the  fabulist  halted,  stemming  the  soar 

of  his  fancy, 
Glaring  a  glance  inquisitive  into  the  face  of 

the  farmer 
Whom  he  had  helped  from  the  mud  at  the 

mulberry  tree  in  the  morning; 
Nor  did  he  falter  to  peer  far  down  in  the 

eyes  of  the  wainwright, 
Whose  approval  he  caught  in  the  radiant 

sport  of  their  sparkles, 
Which  illumined  the  path  of  his  soul  to  its 

nethermost  fountain. 


Then  a  fresh  coin  the  fabulist  fused  in  the 
mint  of  his  fable, 

Giving  a  visible  form  to  his  fantasy's  farth- 
est outreach: 


QQ  LINCOLN   AND   ANN   RUTLEDGE—BOOK   IV, 

"Yes,  a  new  horse  must  be  reared  to  race 

on  our  Western  prairie, 
Steed  with  the  speed  of  the  storm,  he  never 

gets  tired  or  lazy; 
And  a  new  wheel  must  be  forged  for  his 

wagon  far  swifter  and  stronger 
Than  the  old  one  was  ever,  and  whirling 

along  a  new  road-bed. 
All  of  them  are  to  be  formed  of  the  fiercest 

material  metallic — 
All  the  wheel  and  its  pathway  of  rails  and 

the  horse,  too,  of  iron ; 
They  have  started  already  to  fleeting  along 

the  Atlantic, 
But  they  now  must  be  turned  to  the  home 

which  Nature  foreplanned  them, 
To  our  new  world's  domain,  the  newest  in 

time  and  in  spirit." 


Strangely  the  orator  fluent  now  lapsed  at 

a  word  to  a  stammer; 
Once  more  over  the  heads  of  the  people  he 

peered  in  the  distance, 
But  when  he  noted  one  hearer  to  turn  for 

a  look  in  the  same  way, 
Quickly  he  picked  up  the  thought  he  had 

dropped,  and  mended  his  discourse, 
Though  they  all  unwittingly  wondered  just 

why  he  had  wandered: 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN.  $7 

"Now  to  the  practical  point  I  come  of  my 
fabling  fantastic: 

Give  me  your  suffrages  that  I  may  go  to 
Vandalia  this  winter, 

Helping  to  forge  to  the  deed  my  airy  witch- 
work  of  dreamland, 

And  to  harness  the  new-born  horse  of  the 
age  to  his  wagcn 

That  I  too  may  become  for  my  folk  a  wise 
wainwright," 


Loudly  upstormed  the  applause,  but  louder 
the  cheer  of  sage  William 

Bang  over  all  of  the  voices  together  in  waves 
sympathetic, 

Seeing  his  favorite  wheel  endowed  with  a 
new  incarnation, 

For  of  that  work  he  often  had  dreamed  in 
rapture  prophetic. 

Made  to  his  mind  the  civilized  world  must 
be  wheeled  in  its  progress, 

Barbary  only  is  wheelless,  such  is  the  bar- 
barous Indian. 


Feeling  the  worth  of  the  moment,  the  speaker 

now  pointed  his  discourse 
That  it  might  prick  to  the  brain  of  his  hearers 

and  prod  them  to  action: 


68  LINCOLN  AND   ANN   RUTLEDGE—BOOK  IV. 

"Thus,  only  thus,  can  we  ever  be  one  with 

the  rest  of  our  country, 
And  our  country  in  turn  be  united  in  bonds 

adamantine ; 
We  shall  become  a  part  of  the  life  of  the 

globe  in  its  wholeness, 
Live  to  ourselves  in  a  corner  we  cannot,  we 

have  to  associate, 
Long  has  that  been  the  dearest  ambition  of 

little  New  Salem. 
It  would  feel  the  full  heart  of  the  world  in 

its  own  petty  pulse-beat, 
And  would  share  in  the  purposeful  plan  of 

the  ages,  divinely  aspiring". 


So  the  tall  Lincoln  spake  to  one  man  and 

grew  taller  than  ever, 
That  one  man  whom  he  saw  to  the  soul  was 

William  the  wainwright. 
Slowly  he  took  off  his  eyes  and  turned  them 

to  glancing  elsewhither, 
Down  to  the  rivulet  shallow  and  stagnant 

which  stank  in  its  stream-bed, 
Pensively  musing,  "Once  I  believed  in  the 

Sangamon  yonder, 
And  I  piloted  hitherward  up  the  full  stream 

the  first  steamboat, 
While  I  floated  above  on  a  billowy  river  far 

larger — 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN.  (JQ 

Kiver  of  Hope  that  fell  like  a  waterfall  golden 

from  cloudland; 
But  the  treacherous  boat  in  a  panic  retreated 

forever, 
And  the  high  vision  of  Hope  fled  after  it, 

shunning  the  valley. 
No  more  delusion,  0  friends;  instead  of  the 

lie  of  a  shadow 
Now  the  substance  itself  of  our  striving  we 

grip  by  our  ballot, 
Capturing  with  it  the  horse  and  the  wheel 

and  the  highway  of  iron. 
I  would  the  hammer  be,  forging  again  the 

refractory  metal, 

If  you  will  send  me  to  sledge  in  the  work- 
shop of  law  at  Vandalia." 


Scarce  had  the  word  left  the  throb  of  his 
lips  when  the  shout  of  the  blacksmith 

Shot  to  the  ear  of  the  speaker,  hallooing  a 
summons  to  labor, 

That  he  might  prove  by  his  deed  just  what 
he  had  said  to  the  people : 


"Come  now,  Abraham,  sledge  me  this  tire 

whose  hoop  I  am  rounding 
For  the  new  wheel  which  hither  was  rolled 

by  William  the  wainwright 


70  LINCOLN  AND   ANN   RUTLEDGE—BOOK   IV. 

Eestless  until  lie  beholds  the  work  of  his 

handicraft  finished, 
That  it  may  rival  the  starlit  wheel  of  the 

dome  of  the  heavens. 
Then  you  can  make  a  new  speech  on  your 

sledging,  a  better  than  this  one, 
And  a  fresh  fable  you  surely  can  forge  from 

the  blast  of  my  bellows, 
Or  an  old  tale  you  can  pick  from  the  bounti- 
ful pouch  of  your  noddle. 
Come,  you  are  the  best  sledger  that  ever  here 

wielded  my  hammer, 
Striking  the  brawniest  blow  to  subdue  the 

rebellious  metal, 
Making  it  yield  to  the  law  and  welding  both 

sides  into  union.'* 


Soon  then  Peter  the  blacksmith  was  plying 

the  pole  of  his  bellows, 
Playing  it  up  and  down  in  the  clutch  of  his 

fist  and  his  forearm; 
And  the  shop  grew  grim  to  a  choke  with  the 

grime  of  the  charcoal 
Through    whose     cloud-wreaths     spitefully 

snapped  the  sputtering  sparkles, 
Like  the  scintillas  of  lightning  along  the 

dark  seams  of  the  sky-rack, 
Over  whose  black-browed  crags  leap  thunders 

pursuing  the  flashes. 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 


71 


See  now,  the  iron  is  hot  to  a  hiss  at  the  line 

of  division; 
Peter  the  smith  with  a  twitch  of  the  tongs 

took  the  tire  from  the  blazes, 
Whirling  it  down  by  a  dexterous  turn  to  the 

top  of  the  anvil, 
Which  kept  clinking  and  clanking  afar  with 

its  dangerous  cling-clang, 
As  the  tire  he  smote  white  hot  in  the  glow 

of  its  fusion, 
Shrilling  its  scream  in  response  to  the  stroke 

of  his  one-handed  hammer. 
Mightily  bulged  at  each  blow  the  muscular 

brace  of  his  biceps, 
While  the  thews  of  his  neck  would  swell  up 

to  battle  responsive, 
And  from  his  forehead  the  runnels  of  soot 

would  stream  down  his  cheek-bones, 
Till  they  would  drop  from  his  chin  and  the 

tip  of  his  nose  too, 
Like  the  Sangamon's  channel  o'erflowing  its 

banks  in  the  springtide, 
And  on  its  surface  eddying  all  of  the  ooze 

of  the  upland. 


Still  intoned  he  a  song  attuned  to  the  ring 

of  the  iron, 
Or   would  whistle   bravouras   piercing   the 

clang  of  the  anvil, 


72  LINCOLN   AND   ANN   RUTLEDGE—BOOK   IV. 

Which  to  the  sound  of  the  tire  would  shriek 
with  the  wail  of  the  tempest, 

Hit  by  the  hammer  of  Peter  the  smith  at  the 
point  of  their  contact, 

As  he  welded  their  severing  parts  to  har- 
monious wholeness, 

While  in  the  swing  of  his  voice  he  re-echoed 
the  music  of  labor, 

Crooning  some  long-gone  ballad  of  love  and 
piping  the  chorus. 


But  still  mightier  blows  must  be  struck  at 

the  tick  of  the  crisis 
Rightly  to  round  out  the  tire  to  its  circle 

of  iron  unbroken. 
Up  steps  Lincoln,  clutching  the  sledge  in 

the  grip  of  his  knuckles 
When  he  had  carefully  hung  up  his  hat  on 

the  peg  of  a  tie-beam — 
Post-office  hat,  it  was  famed  for  holding  the 

mail  of  the  township. 
Wide  was  the  sweep  of  his  arms  as  he  swung 

his  implement  massive ; 
Clutching  the  handle  with  both  of  his  fists, 

in  rotation  concentric 
Over  his  head  through  the  air  he  whizzed  the 

ponderous  hammer, 
Till  it  smote  down  on  the  tire  and  welded  the 

line  of  disjunction, 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN.  73 

Bounding  the  ring  of  the  wheel  to  a  musical 
cycle  completed, 

Cunningly  winding  its  melody  into  the  song 
of  the  smithy, 

With  a  far-away  echo  like  to  a  spheral  con- 
cordance. 

Next  the  iron  enringing  the  rim  was  clamped 
on  the  feloes, 

Bending  them  slowly  together  into  a  union 
forever. 

Nor  was  the  hub  forgotten,  it  too  was  band- 
ed with  iron 

Lest  in  a  strain  it  might  split  by  the  stress 
of  the  spokes  at  the  center. 

Hark !  in  the  midst  of  the  notes  of  the  smithy 

and  piercing  the  smoke-cloud 
Tolled  the  time-telling  call  of  the  school-bell 

rung  from  the  belfry, 
Waving  its  way  to  the  workshop  in  throbbing 

circles  concordant, 
With  whose  ring  and  refrain  it  mingled  its 

musical  cadence. 

Lincoln  harkened  the  strokes  of  the  bell  as 
they  gave  him  the  time-beat 

From  above  somewhere,  with  resonance  ton- 
ing the  darkness, 


74  LINCOLN   AND    ANN   RUTLEDOE—BOOK   IV. 

To  whose  dulcet  vibrations  accordant  he 
sledged  with  his  hammer, 

Stressing  all  of  the  school-bell's  measures 
with  accent  Titanic. 

Thus  the  orchestra  played  in  that  workshop 
of  Peter  the  blacksmith 

On  its  instruments  chimed  to  the  stroke  of 
the  strong-boned  musicians, 

Far  attuning  the  town  to  the  resonant  key- 
note of  labor, 

Hovering  over  the  Sangamon  valley  in  wavy 
caresses. 


All  had  noticed  how  carefully  Lincoln  had 

lifted  his  head-gear, 
Precious  post-office  hat  like  a  jewelled  crown 

of  a  monarch, 
High  straw-hat  with  a  tetering  brim  and  a 

dent  in  its  top-knot, 
Hanging  it  high  on  a  peg  where  none  but 

himself  could  get  at  it. 
Strangely  forethoughtful  he  seemed  in  that 

act  and  in  eyeing  oft  thither, 
For  he  had  given  out  all  of  the  mail  that  day 

to  its  owners 
In  the  political  round  of  the  town  that  he 

made  in  the  morning. 
Yet  of  that  broad-brimmed  bee-hive  of  straw, 

why  so  tenderly  watchful  ? 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN.  75 

Eight  in  the  whirl  of  his  sledge  he  would 
train  on  the  hat  a  sharp  eye-shot. 

Some  rare  mystery  hides  there  of  which  he 
is  veiling  the  secret, 

Dual  the  man  is,  a  half  on  his  work,  but  a 
half  has  strayed  elsewhere. 


But  now  the  labor  is  done  and  the  hammer 
is  put  in  its  corner, 

Firmly  united  the  parts,  the  whole  wheel  will 
run  on  the  prairie, 

Doing  its  share  of  the  work  of  the  world 
without  going  to  pieces. 

All  applauded  the  workmanship  deft  of  Peter 
the  blacksmith, 

All  applauded  the  powerful  deed  of  the  can- 
didate sledging. 

In  it  they  felt  the  forecast  of  something 
that  lay  in  his  future ; 

What  it  might  be  they  knew  not,  but  wished 
to  be  tuned  to  his  spirit. 

So  they  called  for  a  speech  from  their  spokes- 
man— a  fact  or  a  fable 

Drawn  from  the  Black    Hawk    War,    with 
fringes  of  fun  and  of  fancy, 

Whose  light  play  would  bring  to  them  all  a 
tickle  in  common, 

But    might    likewise    ensconce    the    deepest 
thought  of  the  era. 


76  LINCOLN  AND   ANN   RUTLEDGE—BOOK  IV. 

Then  the  wainwright  slid  from  the  crowd 
with  a  look  of  approval, 

Quickly  he  stepped  on  a  stool,  as  if  to  re- 
spond to  the  speaker, 

But  he  reached  to  the  peg  and  took  down  the 
hat  which  hung  high  there, 

Courteously  handing  it  over  with  compliment 
heaped  on  the  owner, 

Who  had  hurried  at  once  to  the  spot  on  see- 
ing the  danger. 


But  just  look  at  the  luck!  for  out  of  the  hat 

flew  a  letter 
Like  a  dove  white-winged  it  fluttered  around 

in  the  coal-smoke; 
Down  it  fell  in  the  floorless  dust  much-trod 

of  the  smithy. 


Not  a  trace  of  writ  was  upon  it,  no  name,  no 

postmark — 
Yet  a  heart  with  its  blood-tint  was  drawn  on 

the  cover  in  red-ink. 
Lincoln  jumped  at  a  leap  ten  feet  to  the  spot 

when  he  saw  it, 
Picked  it  up  with  a  blush  and  tucked  it  into 

his  bosom. 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN.  77 

All  were  shouting  with  guffaws,  "Abraham, 

read  us  that  letter, 
Never  could  it  have  come  by  mail,  it  is  one 

of  your  own  make; 
Tell  us  who  is  the  girl,  and  whether  she  goes 

to  Vandalia. 
Now  instead  of  the  speech,  just  give  us  the 

nub  of  the  letter. 
"We  shall  not  vote  for  you,  Abe,  unless  you 

read  us  that  letter." 
Then  they  yelled  the  refrain  in  chorus :  ' '  the 

letter!  the  letter !" 


See  the  tall  candidate  plucking  his  hat  from 

the  hand  of  the  wainwright, 
Who  had  soulfully  glimpsed  from  afar  a 

glint  of  his  meaning; 
More  profusely  rolled  watery  drops  on  the 

slant  of  his  forehead 
Than  even  when  he  was  whirling  the  sledge 

for  Peter  the  blacksmith. 
Strange !  the  wan  of  his  cheek  had  suddenly 

flushed  to  a  ruby 
While   his    eyes    sped   their  sparks  on   the 

ground  but  not  on  the  people, 
And  his  lips  had  a  smile,  as  if  merrily  tasting 

a  gallnut. 
All  his  body  grew  stiff,  on  stilts  he  seemed 

to  be  stalking, 


73  LINCOLN   AND   ANN   RUTLEDaE—BOOE   IV, 

As  he  strode  out  the  shop  in  long  strides  e  'en 
while  he  was  saying : 

1  'Friends,  good  day  to  you — elsewhere  busi- 
ness I  have  now  to  see  to." 


So  young  Lincoln  bore  off  in  his  breast  the 

embarrassing  secret. 
Outside  next  to  his  heart  lay  the  letter,  with 

symbol  ensanguined, 
While  the  crowd  much  wondered  about  that 

mysterious  missive, 
Guessing  whom  it  was  meant  for  and  what 

was  its  purport — 
Why  should  Lincoln  so  blaze  up  in  feature, 

and  hurry  to  hide  it  I 


Only  one  man  there  present  had  seen  it  be- 
fore on  the  outside, 

Uncle  George  Trueblood,  who  now  spake  out 
his  limited  knowledge: 

"Well  I  remember  that  heart  with  its  red 
on  the  white  of  the  letter, 

When  the  postmaster  took  off  his  hat  to  hand 
me  my  paper, 

Near  the  mulberry  tree  where  Lincoln  had 
sat  with  Miss  Eutledge; 

Strange  it  seemed  then,  but  I  somehow  for- 
got to  ask  him  about  it. ' ' 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN.  79 

So  this  riddle  with  others  is  left  for  the  fu- 
ture to  settle, 

Which,  untying  one  knot,  will  tie  up  another 
and  greater. 


Meanwhile  Lincoln  had  sped  out  of  sight  of 

the  shop  of  the  wainwright, 
When  a  wag  in  his  humor  gave  voice  to  the 

common  suspicion: 
''Let  me  dare  it  foresay  that  Lincoln  again 

has  a  business 
Which  will  charm  him  awhile  underneath  the 

mulberry  shade-tree." 
Others  kept  citing  the  past  with  its  crop  of 

rumors  fantastic, 
Nor  was  forgotten  the  gossip  which  gushed 

from  the  Talisman's  visit, 
When  the  whole  town  had  a  rollicking  dance 

on  board  of  the  steamboat. 


Still  in  the  practical  matter  before  them  there 

was  an  agreement: 
All  resolved  on  the  spot  to  vote  for  Abraham 

Lincoln, 
Even  if  he  ran  off  to  get  rid  of  reading  the 

letter, 
And  of  relieving  the  people's  suspense  by 

confessing  the  picture. 


80  LINCOLN  AND   ANN   RUTLEDGE—BOOK   IV. 

Not  the  new  wheel  nor  the  horse  nor  the  won- 
derful railway  of  iron, 

Had  been  able  to  stir  up  the  talk  of  the  folk 
of  New  Salem 

Like  the  wafture  so  weird  of  the  sign  of  the 
red-heart  presageful, 

And  of  Lincoln's  attempt  to  hide  it  at  once 
in  his  bosom, 


When  he  had  fled,  the  company  melted  away 

from  its  center, 
William  the  wainwright  and  Squire  Ebenezer 

and  Trueblood  the  farmer, 
Each  on  a  line  leading  homeward  dreamily 

drifted  asunder, 
With  the  citizens   who    had   hearkened  the 

speech,  and  still  marveled 
Not  alone  at  the  sayings,  but  at  the  silences 

also — 
More  mysterious  were  the  deep  silences  than 

the  deep  sayings — 
Which  had  oracled  Lincoln's  whole  conduct 

and  left  him  a  riddle. 


Still  was  heard  from  the  shop  of  the  black- 
smith the  clangor  of  iron, 

With  his  joyous  shrill  whistle  which  fifed  to 
the  drum  of  his  labor, 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN.  3^ 

Whistle  which  tuned  all  the  puff  of  his  bel- 
lows and  clink  of  his  hammer, 

As  he  pounded  and  rounded  the  metal  in  time 
with  his  music, 

Puckering  up  to  a  point  his  muscular  lips  for 
an  air-hole 

Through  whose  vent  he  would  drive  out  his 
breath  with  the  might  of  the  windstorm, 

Mid  the  spirt  of  the  sparkles  which  shot  in 
the  smoke  of  the  worksnop, 

Like  the  links  of  the  lightning  which  rattles 
its  chain  down  the  welkin, 

Making  his  stithy  the  home  of  a  Titan's  huge 
harmony  happy. 

Then  on  the  hill-top  would  chime  the  sym- 

phonious  note  of  the  school-bell, 
Blent  with  keen  cadences  welling  up  out  of 

the  shop  of  the  blacksmith, 
Tenderly  wreathing    in    concord    of  sounds 

each  house  of  New  Salem, 
Sounds  undulating  together  in  love  far  over 

the  landscape, 
Till  they  lisped  out  their  mutual  sighs  to  a 

swoon  in  the  distance. 


Ann  Rutledge. 

Just  when  Lincoln  had  sharpened  his  speech 

to  the  point  of  his  fable, 
Trumpeting  far  the  miraculous  change  of  the 

wheel  into  iron, 
In  the  roll  of  his  voice  upturning  the  folds 

of  the  future, 
Over  the  square  he  glanced  and  glimpsed  the 

form  of  a  maiden 
"Whose  light  trip  he  well  knew,  for  he  often 

in  rapture  Had  watched  it, 
As  it  seemed  lifting  on  wings  the  gracious 

turn  of  her  body, 
While  she  sped  up  the  street  away  from  the 

house  of  her  father, 
Thrilling  the  air  with  an  ecstasy  born  of  her 

beautiful  motion, 
(82) 


ANN  RUTLEDGE.  g3 

Causing  the  orator  just  for  a  moment  to  stam- 
mer forgetful 

Till  he  had  picked  up  the  stitch  he  had 
dropped  in  knitting  the  sentence, 

So  he  soon  healed  in  his  hearers  the  ominous 
breach  of  attention. 


That  was  Ann  Butledge,  the  flower  of  all  the 

village's  maidhood, 
Since  the  hope  of  her  heart  was  blooming 

from  every  feature, 
And  was  shedding  its  magical  spell  on  the 

eye  of  each  gazer; 
Not  untinged  by  a  sorrow,  which  tingled  a 

chord  in  the  bosom, 
Trembled  her  look  sympathetic  with  others, 

yet  with  herself  too. 

She  was  going  to  ply  at  a  quilting  her  dex- 
terous needle, 
And  perchance  to  gossip  a  little  about  the 

last  wedding, 
But  still  more  she  would  take  off  her  mind 

from  the  struggle  within  her, 
Which  she  no  longer  could  leave  in  its  stress 

altogether  unspoken. 


Balm  she  knew  would  be  ready  to  drop  with 
the  word  of  a  woman 


g4     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE—BOOK  V. 

Who  a  solacer  was  in  the  throes  of  the  con- 
flict of  mortals, 

Pouring  the  weal  of  her  sympathy  into  the 
woe  of  the  stricken. 

Also  that  woman  was  famed  as  the  Lady,  the 
neighborhood's  Lady, 

Crowned  with  the  title  by  all — the  Lady  Eu- 
lalia  Lovelace — 

Widow  she  was  of  an  officer  highly  esteemed 
in  the  army, 

Who  in  the  bloom  of  his  youthful  promise  had 
fallen  in  battle, 

Gallantly  fighting  the  foes  of  his  country 
along  the  wild  border, 

Only  a  year  or  two  after  he  quitted  his  home 
in  Virginia, 

Whither  she  wished  to  return,  awaiting  her 
father's  arrival, 

For  she  still  longed,  like  an  exile,  for  the  old 
manor  ancestral 

By  the  seaboard,  with  its  hoar  line  of  heri- 
tage English. 


Now  she  dwelt  with  her  two  young  sons  at 
the  edge  of  the  village 

Where  stood  her  mansion  spacious,  garland- 
ed round  with  a  garden; 

Propped  was  the  roof  of  the  porch  in  front 
with  massive  Greek  columns, 


ANN  RUTLEDGE.  85 

While  it  Heartily  faced  to  the  world  with  the 
gracious  look  of  a  giver, 

Famed  the  best  house  on  the  road,  of  gener- 
ous structure  colonial, 

Always  ready  to  give  to  the  stranger  a  cour- 
teous welcome. 


Thither  the  maiden  was  pensively  tracing  the 

line  of  her  footsteps, 
And  was  turning  a  corner  not  far  from  the 

shop  of  the  wainwright, 
When  she  heard  the  applause  of  a  crowd  mid 

gushes  of  laughter, 
While  the  tall  form  of  a  man  addressing  them 

rose  on  her  vision 
With  a  loud  thump  of  the  heart  to  see  the 

success  of  the  speaker, 
Who  beheld  her  in  turn  and  balked  at  the  pith 

of  his  story, 

Just  for  a  moment  upset  by  the  sudden  sur- 
prise of  her  eye-shot. 


But  she  shied  from  the  spot  and  tripped  more 

rapidly  onward, 
Hardly  she  glanced  at  the  store  as  she  passed 

it,  of  Abner  the  Absent, 
Though  it  waked  in  her  soul  the  tremulous 

thrill  of  a  discord, 


36      LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  V. 

Which  in  a  pain  she  would  flee  from,  although 
it  would  ever  go  with  her — 

For  the  owner  was  still  her  betrothed,  in 
spite  of  his  strange  disappearance. 

Soon  she  had  come  to  the  round  red  school- 
house  perched  on  its  hillock, 

Where  was  centered  the  mind  of  the  town — 
the  head  of  its  shoulders — 

There  she  felt  a  relief  as  she  thought  of  her 
happier  school-days 

Which  she  and  Lincoln  had  spent  in  their 
studies,  growing  together 

Into  a  union  of  soul  no  blow  of  Fate  could  dis- 
sever. 


There  her  memory  stopped  her  a  minute  to 

look  at  the  belfry 
Which  like  a  hat  was  set  on  the  conical  head 

of  the  schoolhonse, 
When  it  suddenly  started  in  tones  well  known 

to  address  her — 
Tones  of  the  bell  which  so  often  had  joyously 

throbbed  to  her  heart-beats, 
Bidding  the  young  to  their  lesson,  and  calling 

the  people  together, 
Whispering  also  to  her  a  sweet  hope  mid  the 

lines  of  her  school-book. 


ANN  RUTLEDGE.  gy 

Tenderly  mused  she  the  time  when  she  went 

to  the  sapient  master, 
Mentor  Graham,  the  faithful,  hard  hitter  in 

word  and  in  action, 
Till  each  pupil  had  learned  how  to  read  and 

to  write  and  to  figure; 
Yet  the  teacher  selected  the  best  for  higher 

instruction, 

Which  he  gave  to  the  boy  and  the  girl  of  tal- 
ent transcendent. 
Well  his  brusque  tongue  was  liked,  in  spite  of 

one  little  suspicion 
That  the  deep  folds  of  his  brain  secreted  a 

doctrine  forbidden. 


Hardly  to  think  it  she  dared,  but  the  circular 

walls  of  the  schoolhouse 
Had  enclosed  her  whole  heart,  and  brought 

it  to  beat  from  that  center 
Where  she  the  counterpart  found  of  life's 

most  intimate  kinship 
Subtly  ingrown  with  herself,  ere  she  knew  it 

in  each  aspiration, 
Though  already  her  hand  she  had  promised 

in  troth  to  another. 
That  was  the  perilous  edge  to  which  Time  had 

been  leading  the  maiden, 
The  remediless  strife  between  two  duties,  to 

love  and  to  promise, 


QQ      LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  V. 

\J\J 

.Was  now  cleaving  her  bosom  atwain  in  their 
mutual  warfare, 

Which  to  avoid  she  hurried  away  with  her 
eyes  insphered  in  their  tearballs. 

Hardly  would  she  confess  to  herself  the  love 
that  had  sprouted 

And  was  daily  ensnaring  her  life  in  its  intri- 
cate network; 

She,  the  promised,  loves  him  who  never  has 
promised  though  hopeful ; 

He,  the  unpromised,  loves  her  who  has  given 
away  her  first  promise. 

Conscience  kept  slashing  her  soul  both  ways, 
in  duty  divided, 

As  she  recalled  a  hot  sermon  on  Hell  by  Cart- 
right,  the  preacher ; 

For  the  sense  of  the  sinful  lay  charactered 
deepest  within  her, 

And  would  rend  her  atwain  in  the  throes  of 
her  tragedy's  conflict. 


Pensive,  forebodeful  she  flew  on  her  path  to 

the  end  of  the  village, 
As  if  to  run  from  her  fantasies  which  like 

dragons  pursued  her, 
Quitting  the  bell-tongued  schoolhouse  tipped 

with  the  clang  of  its  belfry, 
Which  now  fell  from  above  like  a  knell  on  the 

ear  of  the  maiden. 


ANN  RUTLEDGE.  39 

But  how  can  she  esecape  from  the  mightiest 

power  within  her  ? 
Running  away  from  her  giant,  into  his  arms 

she  has  fallen, 
Fleeing  out  of  her  soul-world,  the  more  she 

has  to  stay  in  it. 


Soon  she  has  glided  beneath  the  mulberry 

tree  by  the  wayside, 
One  by  one  now  dropping  its  leaves  in  the 

lap  of  their  mother, 
The  proliferous  Earth  who  entombs  in  her 

womb  her  dead  children 
That  she  may  bear  them  anew  to  life  in  a  glad 

resurrection, 
After  ripe  autumn's  decline  and  the  death  of" 

gray  winter, 
Ever  fulfilling  her  motherly  part  in  the  round 

of  creation. 
Under  that  tree  was  the  rustic  seat  of  cut 

twigs  and  of  grapevines 
Deftly  intwined  together  to  many  a  turn  and 

contortion 

By  the  hand  of  Lincoln  who  made  it  the  favor- 
ite place  of  his  trysting, 
Lonely  for  one  and  large,  for  two  it  was  fitted 

so  neatly 
As  it  lay  on  the  way  to  the  Lady  Eulalia 

Lovelace. 


90     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE.—BOOK  7. 

Now  in  spite  of  an  inner  forbiddance,  Ann 
went  and  reclined  there, 

Giving  herself    to    memories    golden  which 
washed  out  her  struggle 

Till  of  a  sudden  she  looked  at  the  ring  en- 
circling her  finger, 

With  a  quick  jerk  of  her  breath  as  if  she  were 
gasping  in  wrestle. 

That  was  the  symbol  of  shadowy  promise  to 
one  who  was  absent 

Twinned  with  a  love  unbetrothed,  but  impas- 
sioned, for  one  who  is  present. 

Duty  again  is  flaying  her  heart  with  double 
reproaches, 

Secretly  hoping  for  what  she  may  dare  not 
openly  pray  for, 

How  can  she  banish  the  throb  of  her  heart 
forbidden  by  conscience! 


So  her  token  of  love  is  evoking  her  fates  to 

their  duel, 
Still  she  declares  to  herself  the  word  of  her 

promise  unbroken, 
Though  underneath  it  there  runs  a  feeling  of 

lorn  resignation. 
Up  she  springs  from  the  spot  which  seems 

to  be  clamping  her  down  there, 
"While  the  sight  of  the  ring  keeps  tugging  her 

back  from  her  heart 's  push. 


ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


Two  are  the  presences  here  which  fiercely  are 

clashing  within  her; 
From  their  combat  she  flees,  and  yet  she  must 

take  it  along  too. 


But  she  dares  not  look  back  at  the  tree  with 

its  tussle  of  demons 
Till  she  steps  on  the  door-sill  of  Lady  Eulalia 

Lovelace, 
Who  was  already  awaiting  her  skill  in  the 

work  of  the  quilting. 
Ann  soon  darted  the  end  of  a  thread  through 

the  eye  of  her  needle 
And  began  running  in  mazes  the  tortuous 

lines  of  her  stitches 
Pricking  the  many  meandering  plans  to  the 

thrust  of  her  thimble 
Wreathing  in  graceful  curves  the  finger  and 

hand  with  the  forearm, 
As  she  sewed  into  harmony  all  of  the  mani- 
fold patches 
Which  were  a  variance  vast  in  shape  and  in 

size  and  color. 


Both  were  well  in  their  work  and  tuned  to  the 
time  of  their  stitches, 

Lady  Eulalia  bettered  the  moments  with  mer- 
ciful chit-chat : 


92     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RVTLEDGE.—BOOK  V. 

"Not  unlike  to  our  life  is  this  quilt  whose 

shreds  we  are  patching ! 
My  next  neighbor,  the  prosperous  farmer,  fell 

out  with  his  helpmeet 
Tearing  to  pieces  the  family,  scattering  also 

the  children, 
Kent  to   rags  was   the  household,  even  the 

clothes  needed  mending, 
When  I  went  down  to  their  home,  and  sewed 

all  the  fragments  together. 
Easy  to  darn  was  the  dress,  but  to  patch  up 

the  breach  of  the  spirit, 
Was  a  task  far  deeper ;  methinks  no  mortal  is 

able 
Quite  to  point  out  the  spot  where  the  shifting 

wound  of  the  soul  bleeds, 
For  the  soul  is  the  world  ever-present  in 

mind  and  in  body. 
More  discolored    and    ragged    that    family 

seemed  in  its  temper 
Than  these  obstinate  pieces,  which  have  to  be 

suited  toegther 
Into  a  concord  of  tints  which  pairs  with  the 

harmony  inner, 
Smoothing  and  soothing  the  struggle  of  life 

in  a  rainbow  of  solace. 
Just  see  here  in   this    draggled  handful  of 

shreds  of  all  colors, 
Bed  and  yellow,  blue  and  green — what  a  sport 

of  the  spectrum ! 


ANN  RUTLEDGE.  93 

Now  'tis  a  bright  strip,  now  'tis  a  shaded,  yet 

both  must  be  wedded. 
So  I  am  driven  to  picture  the  manifold  hues 

of  all  marriage, 
Not  omitting  my  own  in  the  buoyant  pride 

of  my  girlhood 
When  I  quitted  for  love  my  father's  centur- 

ied  homestead." 


Thus  the  Lady  Eulalia  made  of  herself  the 
confession, 

For  she  too  had  been  taught  by  the  years 
some  lessons  in  living, 

Which  she  imparted  expecting  the  like  in  re- 
turn from  the  maiden, 

Who  still  kept  her  deep  heartthrobs  unsaid 
in  the  plies  of  her  bosom. 

But  once  more  a  sweet  tongue  the  kind  lady 
put  into  the  silence : 

* '  So  the  moments  and  moods  of  our  days  are 
a  crazy  quilt  total, 

Where  the  cloud  and  the  sunshine  go  irides- 
cently  dancing 

Over  the  spaces  of  life,  ever  twinned  as  in- 
separate  partners, 

Painting  on  Time  as  it  rolls  the  shifts  of  the 
soul's  panorama, 

Till  in  our  own  little  self  whirl  the  turns  of 
omnipotent  selfhood." 


94     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  V. 

Carefully  balancing  words  thus  spake  to  the 

maiden  the  lady, 
Who  had  dimly  forefelt  already  the  dawn  of 

the  struggle, 
Seeking  to  stem  in  advance  the  rush  and  the 

crush  of  upheaval. 
Only  a  soulful  look  Ann  Eutledge  repaid  to 

the  speaker, 
But  she  said  not  a  word  of  the  storm  of  the 

thought  she  was  thinking, 
Though  the   Lady  Eulalia   glimpsed,  keen- 
sighted,  the  message 
Which    had    been    sent    from    within,    and 

prompted  the  turn  of  her  question: 


' '  Tell  me,  dear  girl,  what  hear  you  these  days 
from  the  one  who  is  absent? 

When  will  he  come  and  bring  us  the  hour  of 
happy  espousals?'* 

Undertoned  with  a  sigh  then  welled  up  the 
voice  of  the  maiden: 


"It  is  strange;    from   Abner   no   letter  for 

months  I  have  gotten, 
Nor  has  he  sent  any  sign,  not  even  the  print 

of  a  paper. 
I  have  written  again  and  again  to  his  home  in 

New  York  State, 


ANN  RUT  LEDGE.  95 

Not  a  word  returns,  from  his  folks  I  have 
begged  for  an  answer, 

All  in  vain — but  he  may  be  ill — or  something 
the  matter." 

Then  she  laid  down  her  needle,  and  spake  out 
her  thoughts  more  bravely : 

"Aid  I  have  sought  of  our  Postmaster  Lin- 
coln, to  all  so  obliging, 

And  a  note  of  inquiry  he  sent  to  the  town's 
chief  official, 

But  no  response  has  come  thence,  so  still  in  a 
hope  I  am  waiting." 


Here  she  paused  in  the  flow  of  her  speech  as 

if  thinking  elsewhither, 
Even  she  lay  down  her  needle  upon  the  red 

spot  of  her  quilting, 
Lincoln's  name   seemed  prompting  a  mood 

perceptibly  tenser, 
While  the  word  was  picked  up  and  skillfully 

turned  by  the  lady : 
"How  that  youth  keeps  growing,  perchance 

no  longer  in  stature, 
Yet  in  the  people's  esteem  which  sees  him 

waxing  the  hero ! 
Candidate  is  he  just  now,  but  speedily  will  be 

elected ; 

Yesterday  heard  I  till  here  the  crowd  ap- 
plauding the  speaker, 


96      LINCOLN  AXD  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  V. 

Whom  I  somehow  foreshadow  afar  as  the 

man  of  the  future. 
I  remember  him  first  when  he  daringly  boated 

the  milldam; 
Then  you  know  when  he  went  to  the  war,  for 

I  saw  you  engird  him 
"With  the  sword  of  your  ancestors,  sword  of 

the  Butledges  fame-wreathed, 
Which,  as  your  father  once  said,  again  you 

may  have  to  belt  round  him — 
Words  which  often  have  caused  me  to  roam 

in  fantasy's  fame-hall 
Whirling  me  weirdly  aback  to  my  home  by  the 

sea-side  Atlantic 
Where  I  heard  for  a  moment  a  clash — my 

mad  premonition." 


In  a  far-away  revery  was  seeming  the  maiden 

to  wander, 
Though  she  took  up  her  needle  again  and 

threaded  it  deftly. 
Then  she  sewed  in  her  trance  but  knew  not 

what  she  was  sewing, 
Till  she  awoke  at  the  call  of  the  Lady  Eulalia 

Lovelace : 


'Ann,  just  look  at  what  you  are  doing!    You 
take  the  wrong  pieces, 


ANN  RUTLEDGE.  97 

They  are  no  longer  inwrought  to  a  pattern 

around  the  one  center, 
But  are  flying  away  from  each  other  in  every 

direction ; 
Where  should  have  been  that  shadowy  patch 

you  have  put  a  bright  red  one, 
Strip  of  shot  silk,  which  glistens  and  races 

in  ripples  of  color — 
Crazy  my  quilt  will  be  surely  with  all  its 

fantastic  caprices.'* 


Smiling  the  Lady  Eulalia  patted  the  cheek 
of  Ann  Butledge: 

"  Child,  me  thinks  you  are  piecing  the  parts 
of  yourself  in  this  cover, 

Shreds  reflecting  the  mood  of  your  mind  you 
have  sewed  to  a  mirror, 

Which  is  a  gossipy  tattler,  telling  some  stor- 
ies about  you. 

Come,  let  us  rip  out  this  last  insertion,  which 
is  not  happy; 

Here  behold  the  right  strip  to  be  put  in  the 
place  of  the  other, 

For  the  mad  strife  of  hues  it  allays  to  the 
calm  of  its  presence. 

Peace  is  the  boon  of  the  household,  peace  in 
the  act  and  the  object, 

Peace  I  would  fain  patch  up  in  the  quarrel- 
some tints  of  my  bed-quilt." 


98      LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  V. 

Ann  took  her  scissors  and  snipped  each  well- 
stitched  seam  of  her  sewing, 

Till  the  piece  was  loosed  from  its  place  and 
unthreaded  completely; 

But  the  point  of  the  blade  seemed  thrust  to 
shearing  her  heart-strings, 

And  at  each  cut  of  the  pitiless  edge  she  felt 
a  slight  shiver. 

When  the  new  strip  she  had  hastily  sewed  in 
the  place  of  the  other, 

And  had  threaded  her  needle  afresh  for  re- 
newing her  labor, 

Scarce  could  she  throw  her  first  stitch — she 
stopped  in  the  whirl  of  the  second, 

Tips  of  her  fingers  and  thumb  refused  to 
close  on  the  needle, 

Arm  revolted  from  flexing  its  muscles  back- 
ward and  forward, 

So  oppressed  she  felt  with  her  burden  of  in- 
ner convulsion 

Which  upseethed  to  the  surface  out  of  an  un- 
derworld troubled. 


Turning  her  hand  she  glimpsed  the  glistening 

ring  of  betrothal, 
Silent  she  gazed  at  the  blood-grained  ruby 

set  in  the  center, 
Suddenly  dropping  her  needle  and  thread  she 

sighed  out  her  soul  thus : 


ANN  RUTLEDGE.  99 

"Aunt  Eulalia,  this  is  now  all  I  can  do  for 

the  quilting ; 
Not  very  sound  is  my  body  today,  nor  even 

my  temper, 
But  tomorrow  perchance  I  shall  come  when  I 

hope  to  do  better. 
Just  at  present  I  have  to  go  home  and  recover 

my  balance, 
Also  my  household  task  to  fulfill  in  helping 

my  mother." 


Though  she  had  given  no  sound  of  the  rage  of 
the  tempest  within  her, 

Lady  Eulalia  noticed  a  change,  but  left  it  un- 
spoken, 

Thinking  it  wiser  to  let  the  dark  clouds  fleet 
out  of  her  soul-world, 

Or  in  secret  to  rain  down  their  contents  re- 
lieving the  heart-break. 

Ann  had  also  her  happier  task  at  home  in 
weaving  a  garment ; 

But  on  this  work  of  her  loom  her  lips  were 
sealed  to  a  silence. 

Lightly  she  tripped  down  the  way,  though 
throb  fought  throb  in  her  bosom, 

Meanwhile  resolving  to  shun  the  mulberry's 
shadow  persuasive, 

Lest  she  might  hearken  too  long  its  witching 
temptations  to  dreamland. 


100   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE.—BOOK-  V. 

But  behold  as  she  passed,  on  the  seat  sat 

Abraham  Lincoln 

Under  the  tree  with  a  gratified  look  of  seem- 
ing expectance ; 
But  Ann  Eutledge,  summoning  all  of  her 

might  of  resistance, 
Merely  saluted  "Good  evening,"  yet  with  a 

smile  of  approval, 
For  she  well  knew  what  he  came  for,  aye,  she 

in  secret  applauded. 
Then  she  added  on  going,  "Home  I  must 

haste  to  a  task  there." 
What  that  task  might  be  she  breathed  not  a 

syllable  faintly, 
Though  the  thought  of  it  lifted  each  footstep 

in  joy  from  the  highway. 


Soon  she  had  passed  by  the  well-sweep  in 

front  of  the  round  red  schoolhouse, 
Over  the  public  square  and  into  the  door  of 

her  father. 
Slyly  she  slid  out  of  sight  till  she  came  all 

alone  to  her  work-room, 
Where  the  sound  of  her  loom  gave  instant 

relief  to  her  struggle, 
For  she  was  weaving  a  garment  in  which 

seemed  woven  her  brain-throbs, 
As  she  played  out  the  thread  of  the  shuttle 

to  shifts  of  the  treadle. 


AN'N  RUTLEDGE.  1Q1 

So  the  pair  were  parted  that  day,  though 

joined  in  their  heart-beats, 
Each  had  felt  the  tense  stretch  of  the  other's 

innermost  conflict, 
Each  was  bearing    a    secret  within,  uncon- 

fessed  to  the  other. 
Lincoln  had  written  the  letter  stained  with 

the  figure  of  crimson, 
But  to  deliver  it  then,  he  failed  in  the  fetch 

of  his  courage. 
Ann  in  her  turn  had  in  mind  a  new   handsel 

she  was  preparing, 
But  about  it  she  kept  her  tongue  tied  in  the 

presence  of  Lincoln. 


Thus  both  hid  from  each  other  in  silence  their 
mutual  tokens, 

Hid  from  each  other  in  silence  alike  their  mu- 
tual love-sighs, 

Though  their  tale-telling  eyes  had  tattled  of 
each  to  the  other. 

Lincoln,  so  baffled,  at  first  felt  embittered, 
even  rejected, 

For  a  moment  he  tasted  the  wormwood  of 
love  disappointed; 

But  from  his  own  reproaches  he  soon  is  de- 
fending the  maiden 

All  to  himself,  and  praising  her  just  for  her 
deed  of  refusal: 


102   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDQE.—BOOK  V. 

1 1  Then  she  was  strong — I  admire  her  the  more 
— when  she  quit  me  though  wishing ; 

Stronger  than  I  was  in  this  that  I  ought  not, 
I  know,  to  have  come  here. 

She  has  taught  me  a  lesson — a  living  example 
of  duty.' > 

Quickly  he  rose  and  started  away  with  good 
resolutions 

To  be  dutiful  also,  and  drive  out  his  bosom 
the  love-fiend, 

Who  had  sneaked  in  upon  him,  a  demon  en- 
snaring his  conscience; 

But  from  this  poignant  attack  on  himself  he 
soon  will  recover, 

Oneness  of  Love  overmasters  twoness  of  du- 
bious Duty. 


Happily  hymned  the  maiden  her  heart  to  the 

tune  of  her  hand-stroke, 
Love  of  her  work  with  the  work  of  her  love 

was  merrily  married 
As  she  thought  of  the  man  for  whom  the  new 

vesture  was  woven, 
Even  she  dreamed  she  was  making  a  fabric  to 

last  him  a  life-time, 
Which  he  might  wear  in  his  heart  unforgotten 

for  all  of  his  future. 


I00h 


The  People. 

Listen  again  to  the  bell  on  the  top  of  the 
little  red  schoolhouse, 

Rollicking  resonant  roundels  over  the  val- 
ley and  woodland, 

With  its  hemisphere  musical  layered  above 
and  about  it, 

In  the  windless  calm  of  the  evening  intoning 
its  far-away  echoes, 

Till  they  drop  to  a  tingle  that  taps  on  the  ear 
of  the  farmer 

Who  in  response  at  once  sets  out  for  the  hill 
of  New  Salem, 

Where  the  people  now  gather  to  hear  the  can- 
didate Lincoln, 

And  to  vote  him  the  lawmaker  new  to  be  sent 
to  Vandalia. 

(103) 


104    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VI. 

So  he  will  start  his  career  from  the  town  and 

the  State  to  the  Nation, 
On  the  way  up  to  the  top  where  perches  now 

President  Jackson. 
For  the  humblest  can  mount  to  the  highest 

position  in  office, 
Such  is  the  quest  of  the  world,  which  is 

marching  this  road  to  its  future. 
Each  bright  boy  of  the  village  has  heard  the 

prophecy  splendid, 
"You  will  get  to  be  President,  such  is  your 

wonderful  talent," 
Ever  unsealing  within  him  the  sources  of 

high  aspiration ; 
This  prediction  was  bruited  to  Lincoln  and 

thousands  of  others. 


So  on  the  hillock  was  hiving  the  swarm  of 

the  busy-tongued  people, 
Who  had  winged  to  the  spot  from  the  farthest 

rim  of  the  township, 
Loving  the  buzz  of  their  talk  sweet-tipped 

with  anecdote's  honey, 
Waiting,  however,  to  taste  of  the  humor  of 

Lincoln's  last  story, 
Which  would  make  their  glad  diaphragms 

dance  in  a  chorus  of  laughter, 
And  would  paint  in  bright  tints  all  the  clouds 

of  the  turbulent  welkin. 


THE  PEOPLE.  105 

But  behold  of  a  sudden  a  change  in  the  mood 
of  the  Many ! 

All  are  sorrowed  to  see  the  lachrymal  look 
of  Jack  Kelso 

As  he  shuffled  among  them  with  downcast 
eye  penitential, 

Every  man  in  low  voice  was  asking  his  neigh- 
bor: "What  can  be  the  matter?" 

Still  they  saluted  him  cheerily,  but  how 
changed  from  his  grinning ! 

Soberly  streaked  is  tHe  flood  of  his  face  for 
the  first  in  a  life-time ! 


In  the  foray  with  Black  Hawk  he  followed 

the  soldiers  and  Lincoln, 
As  the  reciter  of  ballads  of  which  his  brain 

was  the  storehouse; 
Chiefly  of  Shakespeare's  lines  he  became  the 

mighty  intoner, 
Voicing    the    reverberation    of   thunderous 

words  from  his  fog-horn ; 
Then  would  Doctor  Palmetto  bemock  him  in 

verses  of  Latin 

From  the  old  classical  measures  sung  by  Ver- 
gil and  Horace, 
Which  not  a  soul  understood  when  the  laugh 

of  the  crowd  was  the  loudest. 
But  how  otherwise  now  have  become  Jack's 

word  and  his  action ! 


106    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  71. 

Thin  in  his  face,  demure  in  his  look,  and  his 

figure  stoops  humbled! 
That  is  Jack  Kelso,  not  as  he  once  was,  but 

as  he  now  is ; 
Once  defiant  of  fate  and  of  duty  and  even  of 

conscience, 
Living  the  life  untasked,  and  pursuing  the 

wayward  Muses. 


Merrily  rose  the  cry  of  the  crowd,  at  his  pres- 
ence delighted: 
"Come,  Jack,  thunder  us  mightily  Antony's 

speech  over  Caesar. 
Swell  up  your  voice  and  make  it  as  big  as  the 

words  of  Will  Shakespeare." 
But  not  a  line  will  he  cite  or  grandly  declaim 

as  his  wont  was ; 
"Nay,"  he  responded,  reproving  the  crowd, 

"No  more  of  his  verses! 
That  unhallowed  bard  of  Avon !  I  spurn  him 

forever ! 
I  permit  not  one  of  his  lines  to  slip  from  my 

tongue- tip, 
My  abhorrence  of  what  I  once  loved  I  confess 

with  a  sorrow, 
Deeply  repentant  I  feel  of  all  of  my  former 

devotion." 


THE  PEOPLE. 


Then  Jack  Kelso  repeated  with  unction  a 

verse  of  the  Bible, 
Giving  a  lurid  recital  of  fiery  woes  of  In- 

ferno ; 
Also  he  chanted  in  fervor  ecstatic  old  hymns 

of  the  backwoods. 
Wonderful    transformation!      His    favorite 

grog  he  renounced  too, 
Even  his  fiddle  he  broke  into  slivers  as  some- 

thing Satanic, 
Lest  with  its  strains  it  might  lead  him  away 

into  paths  of  temptation, 
Playing  the  music  of  dancers  of  jigs  and  of 

reels  and  of  hornpipes. 
But  to  hard  toil  he  could  not  be  broken  by  any 

conversion  ; 
Still  his  love  was  to  laze  on  a  log  in  the  sun- 

shine recumbent, 
Fishing  away  his  happiest  days  in  the  San- 

gamon's  ripples. 


What  was  the  power  which  wrought  such  a 

change  in  the  sinner  Jack  Kelso  f 
Through  all  the  cabins  along  the  wild  border 

and  over  the  prairies 
Had  resounded  a  voice  like  the  call  of  the 

trumpet  from  Heaven, 
That  of  old  Peter  Cartright,  the  Methodist 

preacher  Titanic 


108   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDaE.—BOOE  VI. 

Preaching  the  gospel  of  peace  and  bidding 

prepare  for  last  Judgment. 
Yet  a  good  fighter  he  went  with  his  people 

against  the  red  Indian, 
Who  was  the  Canaanite  doomed  from  on  high 

to  be  landless  and  lifeless. 
So  in  the  Black  Hawk  war  he  too  as  a  soldier 

enlisted, 
And  he  prayed  as  he  shot  at  the  foes  of  the 

God-chosen  people, 
Heathenish  red-skinned  foes,  usurping  the 

land  of  white  Christians. 


Only    last    month    a    religious  revival  had 

stormed  through  New  Salem, 
Stirring  all  of  the  underworld's  depths  of 

seething  emotion 
Which  had  been  layered  down  in  the  soul  with 

the  lapse  of  the  ages. 
But  it  was  tapped  by  the  tongue  of  Cartright 

and  burst  to  the  surface, 
Overwhelming  each  man  in  a  tide  from  the 

ocean  within  him, 
Crushing  to  earth  the  smit  sinner  beneath 

the  words  adamantine 
Till  he  would  gasp  and  groan  and  shout  in 

agony  hellish, 
For  the  revenge  in  his  heart  which  sprang 

of  his  life  in  the  backwoods. 


THE  PEOPLE.  109 

That  was  his  sin — revenge — which  he  felt  as 

his  devil  and  master, 
Which  remained  in  his  heart  long  after  the 

Indian  departed, 
And  transmitted  the  feud  to  the  borderer 

wreaking  his  grudges. 


Aye,  the  preacher  himself  partook  of  the  sin 
of  his  people, 

And  his  mighty  damnation  was  also  his  secret 
confession, 

For  he  too  was  aware  of  the  guilt  of  revenge 
in  his  bosom. 

That  was  the  source  of  his  power  in  depicting 
the  blazes  of  Hell-fire; 

Torturing  victims  of  wrath,  he  tortured  him- 
self as  a  victim; 

There  lay  his  worth — he  would  punish  him- 
self with  the  lashes  of  conscience, 

Voicing  the  penalty  due  to  the  world  for  the 
same  kind  of  sinning. 


Such  was  the  preacher 's  luminous  gift  in 

lighting  Inferno 
Over  the  prairie,  along  the  border,  in  every 

hamlet, 
"Wreaking  return  of  the  deed  in  the  heart  of 

the  vengeful  transgressor. 


HO  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUT  LEDGE. —BOOK  VI. 

All  the  town  had  been  sulphured  and 
scourged  through  that  fiery  furnace 

By  the  revivalist  just  on  this  spot  of  the  little 
red  schoolhouse, 

Which  in  his  furious  words  would  seem  to  be 
blazing  in  brimstone. 

Women  would  wail,  and  men  would  moan,  mid 
curses  Satanic ; 

Some  fell  down  in  a  fit,  turned  stark  and  chill 
in  the  body 

Through  the  mighty  downpour  of  the  preach- 
er's fulmined  perdition; 

Others  more  balanced,  secretly  vowed  to  be 
good  in  the  future, 

Not  quite  willing  to  wear  their  repentance  in 
view  of  the  public. 


Even  the  gentle  Ann  Rutledge  was  touched 
with  a  twinge  of  her  conscience — 

Maidenly  innocence  deeply  responsive  to  ter- 
ror religious, 

Bearing  back  home  a  cleft  soul  now  aware  of 
its  innermost  conflict, 

When  she  had  listened  to  Cartright's  furious 
discourse  on  passion, 

Which  he  had  kindled  from  Jezebel 's  deed  as 
told  in  the  Scriptures. 


THE  PEOPLE. 


But  another  still  source   of  her   soul    was 

stirred  by  the  preacher 
Tenderly  talking  now:  "God  is  Love,  but 

Love  unfulfilled  here, 
God  is  Love  undying,  but  realized  only  by 

dying, 
Love  of  Duty  is  manly,  but  Duty  of  Love  is 

Godlike." 
All  this  sank  in  the  soul  of  young  Ann,  the 

innocent  maiden, 
Where  the  criss-cross  of  Life  had  planted  al- 

ready the  future  — 
Sensitive  soul  to  the    least   little    prick  of 

priestly  monition. 


Somehow  Lincoln  kept  out  of  that  flood  of  fer- 
vor volcanic, 

Too  tender-hearted  to  hearken  the  torture  of 
saint  or  of  sinner, 

Or  refusing  to  hate  the  All-hater,  even  the 
Devil. 


Now  Jack  Kelso  was  one  of  those  caught  in 

the  cyclone  religious 
Which  oft  swept  the  frontier  and  bore  all  in 

its  path  up  to  Heaven 


X12    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VI. 

"With  a  mysterious  might  irresistible,  deemed 

superhuman. 
All  his  poetry  was  burnt  out  of  him  like  a  dry 

prairie, 
Not  a  verse  could  he  sing  any  more,  the  psalm 

song  excepted, 
Which  he  led  at  the  church  edifying  to  all  of 

the  people. 
Even  his  friend,  kind  Lincoln,  he  shunned, 

who  would  plague  him  for  verses, 
Who,  unregenerate  still,  might  tempt  him  by 

funning  to  laughter, 
Or  bewitch  him  with  charms  of  old  fables,  the 

lies  of  the  Devil, 
Aye,  the  worst  sort  of  lies  of  the  Father  of 

Lies,  the  first  Liar. 


But  the  little  red  schoolhouse  was  witness  to 
other  excitements, 

As  the  common  hot  center  of  all  the  commun- 
ity 's  passions, 

Even  the  temperance  talker  could  tease  to 
intemperate  anger, 

For  the  corngod  too  had  his  temple  and  wor- 
shippers zealous, 

Who  would  avenge  any  slanderous  words 
blaspheming  their  idol. 


THE  PEOPLE. 


Also  the  mesmeric  lecturer  raised  by  his  art 

a  small  riot, 
As  he  in  league  with  Satan  was  seen  enchant- 

ing his  victim, 
Or  would  read  at  a  distance  the  minds  of  his 

spell-haunted  people. 


Oft  on  the  grass  nearby  two  wrestlers  would 
meet  in  a  challenge — 

Thus  to  settle  the  problem,  which  one  of  the 
twain  was  the  better — • 

Or  perchance  by  trial  to  find  the  best  man  of 
the  township; 

Each  had  his  friends  who  failed  not  at  last 
to  take  part  in  the  tussle — 

Hard-fisted  yeomanry,  ready  to  fight  in  a  min- 
ute the  Indian, 

Or  if  he  were  not  present,  to  have  a  free  bout 
with  each  other. 


So  the  village  would  surge  far  out  on  the 

boisterous  border, 
Daring  to  vanguard  the  civilized  world  in 

front  of  the  savage, 
Where  the  tempest  is  ready  to  rage  on  the 

outside  and  inside — 
With  all  the  tumult  of  life  sailing  into  the  sea 

of  Hereafter. 


114  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VI. 

But  the  deepest  upheaval  that  ever  had 
shaken  New  Salem, 

Afterward  keeping  the  town  divided  in 
thought  and  in  feeling, 

Roared  when  the  bold  abolitionist  came  and 
began  his  harangue  there, 

Scattering  pamphlets  in  print  and  trumpet- 
ing talks  from  the  schoolhouse, 

Which  assailed  black  slavery  and  favored  the 
freedom  of  negroes. 

Boys  hissed  on  by  Doctor  Palmetto  would  an- 
swer with  hooting, 

Then  they  bespattered  the  speaker  with  hens ' 
eggs,  not  sparing  the  rotten, 

Till  not  an  egg  was  left  at  the  store  of  Abner 
the  absent; 

Still  the  man  kept  talking  in  spite  of  the 
smear  and  the  odor, 

Braving  the  threat  which  gave  him  an  hour 
for  quitting  the  village. 


Four  of  the  stalwart  townsmen  then  seized 

the  hapless  offender, 
Bearing  him  down  to  the  Sangamon  's  waters 

and  ducking  him  under, 
Till  he  crawled  out  dripping  and  sat  on  a 

stone  in  the  sunshine. 
Next  they  piled  up  the  perilous  pamphlets 

and  set  them  to  blazing, 


THE  PEOPLE. 


Though  some  sought  to  dissuade  them  and 
took  the  wet  man  from  his  captors. 


One  of  his  rescuers  was  the  roused  school- 
master, Mentor  presageful, 

Who  dared  threaten  the  boisterous  mob  with 
the  whirl  of  his  ferule, 

Though  suspected  himself  of  a  bent  to  the 
damnable  doctrine; 

He  f oresaid  in  the  fit  of  his  foresight  the  pen- 
alty coming : 

"For  this  deed  you  will  yet  have  to  give  of 
yourselves  the  full  payment; 

Something  of  yours,  I  proclaim,  will  soon 
have  to  burn  for  this  burning, 

Fate  you  invoke  on  your  town  and  the  doom 
of  retributive  Furies." 


Lincoln  also  was  present  and  lent  his  arm 

to  the  rescue, 
But  to  the  crowd  he  spake  a  calm  sentence, 

yet  with  a  fore-cast : 
"I  believe  in  free  speech,  though  I  may  not 

agree  with  the  speaker; 
But  I  shall  dare  foretell  you  the  future  which 

comes  of  repression : 
You  will  yet  have  to  listen  to  what  this  man 

has  been  saying." 


LINCOLN  AND  INN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VI. 


Though  some  tongues  wagged  bitterly  over 

the  action  of  Lincoln, 
Then  and  afterward  calling  him  nicknames 

with  Doctor  Palmetto, 
Who  had  now  a  new  ground  of  dislike  for  the 

worth  of  his  rival, 
Still  the  people  forgave  and  forgot,  e'en  those 

not  approving; 
History  soon  too  remote  was  that  deed  in 

rapid  New  Salem, 
Though  it  had  left  on  the  village  a  shred  of 

uncanny  remembrance 
Which  had  better  be  buried  by  time  in  eerie 

oblivion, 
Than  dug  up  for  exploiting  the  pleasures  of 

retaliation. 


So  the  citizens  flocked  to  the  place  at  the  call 
of  the  school-bell, 

And  were  talking  in  voluble  groups,  not  spar- 
ing the  village ; 

Even  another  remove  to  the  borderland  sav- 
age was  hinted, 

Once  more  obeying  the  transmitted  impulse 
to  turn  to  the  sunset 

Which  never  failed  to  throb  in  the  heart  of 
the  restless  frontiersmen. 


THE  PEOPLE. 


Even  the  well-weighing  Squire  made  an  eye 

which  glinted  departure, 
And  the  wainwright,  though  old,  was  faced 

with  a  smile  of  approval. 


But  behold !  what  is  yonder,  winding  around 

on  the  highway? 
Soon  a  slow  train  heaves  up  into  town  mid  the 

stare  of  the  people ; 
Three  large  wagons  with  covers  of  drilling 

which  vaulted  their  contents, 
Carrying  household  goods  paled  high  with 

women  and  children, 
Nor  was  wanting  the  new-born  babe  with  its 

well-bosomed  mother. 
So  they  formed  a  full  chain  that  linked  from 

the  past  to  the  future, 
Over  whose  line  was  fleeting  the  spark  of  the 

spirit  electric, 
Bearing  History's  soul  to  its  new-world  home 

in  the  Northwest. 


When  the  first  wagon  had  come  to  the  school- 
house's  tetering  well-sweep, 

Youthful  the  owner  leaped  down  to  the 
ground  to  water  his  horses, 

Which  with  many  a  puff  had  sturdily  wound 
up  the  hillside. 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VI. 


"Where  are  you  going?"  was  asked  by  the 

throng  that  gathered  about  him  ; 
1  i  On  to  the  wild  Mississippi,  aye,  still  onward 

across  it," 
Said  the  youth  as  he  thrust  down  the  pole  of 

the  stone-balanced  well-sweep, 
While  there  pulsed  in  his  voice  the  westering 

beat  of  migration. 
All  that  crowd  felt  the  throb  and  secretly 

wished  to  go  with  him, 
As  he  leaped  to  his  seat  and  clucked  to  his 

team  to  step  forward, 
Which  then  planted  their  hooves  and  straight- 

ened up  stoutly  the  trace-chain^. 
Not  a  half  dozen  years  had  run  since  New 

Salem  was  founded, 
Still  its  people  are  feeling  today  a  fresh 

flight  in  their  bosom. 


Slowly  a  carriage  now  rolled  up  the  knoll  to 

the  thirst-slaking  waters; 
Old  was  the  driver  who  called  in  his  need  for 

help  from  his  negro, 
When  to  the  question  of  Doctor  Palmetto  he 

plaintively  answered : 
"I  unwilling  have  quitted  my  home  and  my 

blood  in  the  coast-lands, 
Where  my  ancestral  family  bloomed  for  six 

generations, 


THE  PEOPLE. 


My  armorial  seal  from  England  is  stamped 

on  this  carriage. 
I  dislike  your  prairies  so  level,  they  level  me 

also, 
And  I  confess  me  not  wholly  in  love  with  your 

one  sort  of  freedom. 
But  my  young  folks  are  dragging  me  onward 

until  I  turn  backward." 
Yet  he  tickled  his    steeds   by   his  lash  and 

trailed  with  the  others. 


Soon  the  third  full  wagon  pulled  up  to  the 

bountiful  well-head, 
When  a  man  climbed  down  by  the  hub  of  the 

wheel  to  the  horse-trougE. 
On  his  middle-aged  face  the  years  had  writ- 
ten their  message 
Which  was  telling  a  tale  of  the  sorrow  and 

joy  of  deliverance ; 
To  the  question:  "What  state  do  you  hail 

from!"  he  answered: 
* '  Over  the  mountains  our  journey  has  wound 

from  distant  Virginia; 
Loth  I  was,  I  acknowledge,  to  leave  the  loved 

land  of  my  fathers, 
But  I  forefelt  the  hour  of  reckoning  big  with 

misfortune, 
And  with  my  children    I  fled   to  your  free 

Northwest  from  the  Judgment," 


120  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUT  LEDGE. —BOOK  VI. 

Some  of  his  listeners  dreamed  what  he  meant, 

but  one,  and  one  only, 
Grasped  the  full  sweep  of  his  bodeful  words 

-'twas  Abraham  Lincoln, 
Who  with  the  crowd  was  watching  the  wavy 

procession  of  wagons, 
As  they  heaved  up  the  road  to  the  well,  then 

sank  down  the  hillside, 
Hazily  vanishing  out  of  the  view  in  the  San- 

gamon  valley. 


But  the  man  who  looked  at  them  longest  was 

Squire  Ebenezer, 
Who  had  asked  them  to  stay  in  New  Salem, 

but  none  of  them  tarried. 
Over  him  came  the  old  feeling  to  rear  a  new 

communal  structure, 
Thrice  in  his  life  he  had  done  it,  and  longed 

to  do  it  the  fourth  time. 
Silent  in  wonder  stood   gazing    the    people 

adown  from  the  hillock, 
For  they  saw  too  themselves  in  these  emi- 
grants pushing  to  sunset — 
What  they  had  done  in  the  past  and  still 

might  do  in  the  future. 


When  the  last  wisp  of  the  wavering  wain  to 
a  cloudlet  had  sunken, 


THE  PEOPLE. 


All  turned  round  to  the  platform  of  scantling 

high-piled  for  the  speaker, 
Candidate  Lincoln,  who  speedily  picked  up 

the  thought  of  the  people  ; 
Thus  he  started  to  form  it  to  words  deep- 

hewn  from  his  reason  : 


"  Strange  how  man  still  keeps  on  his  way 

round  the  world  to  the  westward, 
Building  his  home,  his  town,  his  State,  and 

also  his  Nation, 
That  he  may  dwell  with  his  kind  in  a  house 

of  invisible  structure 
Safely,  ever  devote  to  the  task  of  fulfilling 

his  freedom ! 
All  this  he  bears  in  his  brain  more  lasting 

than  chattel  or  cattle, 

Making  his  weal  what  unites  in  one  bond  him- 
self and  his  fellow. 
Here  the  husbandman  tills  his  own  lot,  and 

is  lord  of  it  wholly, 
Still  he  belongs  to  an  order  above  him,  and 

has  to  pay  taxes. 
Ownership  first  of  the  soil  is  his  motto  writ 

in  his  heart's  blood 
Whose  red  drops  he  often  has  paid  to  the 

murderous  savage; 
Then  he  is  owner  in  fee  of  himself  too,  and 

rightly  a  freeman, 


122    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOE  VI. 

Able  to  make  of  the  land  a  free  world  and 

to  rule  it  in  freedom, 
And  he  starts  of  himself  on  his  way,  without 

king,  without  nobles; 
Not  from  above,  from  below  upwells  now  the 

fount  of  the  Time-stream; 
Self-directed  the  man,  himself  in  his  might 

his  own  patron, 
Visible  hews  he  his  house  out  of  wood  and 

other  material, 
But  an  invisible  tenement  also  he  builds  of 

his  spirit, 
"Which  he  lives  in  with  all  his  community 

jointed  together ; 
And  methinks,  too,  himself  he  is  building 

meanwhile  the  new  man, 
Now  first  appearing  as  character  writ  on 

history's  pages — 
Architect  thrice — of  his  home,  of  himself,  of 

his  own  institution." 


Lincoln  now  felt  he  had  soared  to  the  clouds 

out  of  sight  of  his  people, 
One  man  only  excepted;  at  once  he  swoops 

down  to  the  earth  with  an  image : 
"All  your  farms  close-clustered  around  us 

are  cells  of  the  bee-hive, 
Each  has  its  own  busy  occupant  who,  while 

gathering  honey, 


THE  PEOPLE.  123 

Chooses  the  law    to    govern    himself    and 

chooses  its  maker, 
Whom  I  desire  to  be,  and  now  solicit  your 

suffrage : 
Choose  ye,  0  children  of  God  in  this  new 

promised  land,  me  your  Moses. " 


So  he  spake,  and  the  strong-boned  tillers  of 
Sangamon  county 

Shouted  assent  to  the  flattering  speech  of 
their  candidate  lofty, 

For  they  all  understood  when  he  told  them 
in  words  of  the  Scripture, 

Then  he  straightened  himself  to  a  plumb- 
line  and  sped  his  oration: 


"Here  we  stand  at  the  front  of  this  Nation 
ever  advancing, 

Stand  at  the  front  of  civilization  itself  roll- 
ing onward, 

As  it  streams  through  our  prairies  up  to  the 
Father  of  Waters; 

Nor  can  it  there  be  detained,  but  to  the  Pa- 
cific it  surges. 

This  little  village  has  slid  down  the  ages  to 
hold  us  together; 

Hoary  its  ancestry  reaches  in  time,  if  we 
knew  how  to  trace  it. 


124    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VI. 

Just  in  that  line  of  wagons  we  saw  is  borne 

a  young  harvest, 
Seeds  of  communities  free,  sown  over  the 

lands  of  the  Northwest, 
Free  of  too  many  forefathers,  free  of  too 

much  tradition, 
Though  we  lovingly  look  at  the  ancestor  back 

where  we  left  him. 
"We  have  fled  from  our  own  old  world  along 

the  Atlantic, 
Over  the  mountains  down  into  the  one  Great 

Valley  united, 
There  to  build  the  new  world  which  puts  into 

order  man's  freedom, 
If  the  new  lawgiver  may  but  appear  in  the 

Ealls  of  Vandalia. 
Who  he  is  I  might  guess,  were  I  not  by  my 

modesty  tongue-tied." 


Here  one  man  of  them  all  broke  into  a  titter 
disdainful, 

That  was  Doctor  Palmetto,  the  finder  of 
faults  and  diseases, 

Foremost  troubler  of  all  the  town  and  its 
champion  critic, 

Antipathetic  far  down  in  his  soul  to  the  prom- 
ise of  Lincoln. 

Just  one  glance  fire-barbed  the  speaker  shot 
out  at  the  Doctor, 


PEOPLE.  125 


Then  to  a  silence  lie  clicked  down  his  throat 

the  rise  of  his  choler, 
Changing  his  eye  and  his  tone,  he  seemed  to 

look  into  the  future  : 


"Let  me  foresay  the  ominous  word  awaiting 
fulfillment : 

We  shall  have  to  turn  round  and  go  back  to 
the  land  whence  we  started, 

Back  to  the  sea-locked  States  which  we  or  our 
parents  once  quitted, 

Well  overworking  that  old  world  into  our  new 
one  and  better. 

Yon  tented  wagon  now  slowly  drowsing  away 
in  the  distance 

Will  be  wheeling  about  with  the  years  to  re- 
turn to  Virginia 

Making  it  free,  and  re-bearing  it  into  the  re- 
born Union, 

Aye,  re-building  the  old  commonwealths  once 
settled  from  Europe, 

After  the  type  of  the  State  first  seen  at  the 
birth  of  our  Northwest. 

Nor  overlooked  shall  it  be  too — the  birthdom 
of  Doctor  Palmetto." 


With  an  ironical  twinkle  infusing  each  line 
of  his  features 


126    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VI. 

Lincoln  then  turned  to  the  people  who  won- 
dered at  what  he  was  saying, 

For  they  could  not  easily  catch  up  that  pros- 
pect prophetic, 

He  himself,  when  not  in  the  glow,  could 
scarcely  repeat  it. 

Harder  perchance  he  had  hit,  if  he  had  not 
beheld  James  Eutledge 

Who  was  also  a  native  where  grows  the  fan- 
leafed  Palmetto — 

Of  the  good  citizens  first,  and  he  had  too  a 
beautiful  daughter, 

Who  stood  listening  there  on  the  top  of  the 
knoll  with  her  father. 

So  the  wordrich  orator  also  knew  how  to  be 
silent ; 

Deftly  he  turned  to  the  theme  of  the  time  in 
a  present  example : 


"Let  us  recall  that  lumbering  wagon  which 

passed  here  before  us : 
All  of  its  parts — the  wheel  and  its  axle,  the 

horse  and  the  road  too — 
That  whole  outfit  must  soon  be  transformed 

in  its  speed  and  its  power. 
'Tis  too  weak,  too  slow,  too  costly  to  meet  the 

endeavor 
Born  of  the  age  and  the  country  which  has 

to  construct  a  new  carriage 


THE  PEOPLE.  127 

Whirling  our  products  and  us  with  the  wind 

from  ocean  to  ocean. 
That  laborious  horse  must  be  changed  out  of 

flesh  into  iron, 

That  he  may  race  all  day  and  all  night  with- 
out wilting  weary, 
Bonding  in  speed  our  States  to  a  Union  more 

closely  than  ever, 
Crossing  the  line  of  the  North  and  the  South 

where  it  seems  to  be  rifting, 
On  a  bridge  well-jointed  of  rails  made  of 

metal  the  stoutest. 
And  that  tireless  steed  would  align  our  town 

with  the  earth's  folk 
Turning  extension  of  Space  to  the  swiftness 

of  Time  with  his  gallop. ' ' 


Thus  the  orator  voiced  the  deep  though  vague 

aspiration 
Of  his  townsmen  ambitious — only  the  Doctor 

dissented : 
If  for  a  moment  he  heard  the  far-reaching 

forecast  of  Lincoln, 
There  would  befall  him  a  sudden  attack  of 

mental  dyspepsia. 


Brightly  uprose  the  next  day  the  sun  of  the 
Candidate's  trial, 


128    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLED&E.—BOOK  VI. 

When  the  last  ray  had  expired,  the  judges 

declared  him  elected. 
But  not  fully  unanimous  counted  the  vote  in 

his  favor, 
One  torn  ballot  with  No  written  over  it  was 

the  exception, 
Yet  without  any  name  or  design  inscribed  on 

the  paper ; 
Still  the  town  was  agreed  in  spelling  the 

name  of  the  voter. 


Next  a  bon-fire  was  built  to  the  shout  of  Lin- 
coln elected, 

Store-boxes,  tar-barrels,  aye,  and  the  plat- 
form's newly-sawn  scantling, 

With  some  cordwood  were  heaped  up  and 
kindled  to  flames  on  the  hilltop, 

Which  shone  far  down  the  valley  with  tidings 
of  Lincoln  elected. 

All  the  men  of  the  township  were  standing 
around  the  big  bon-fire, 

Which  flashed  ghostly  reflections  over  the 
ships  of  white  cloudland, 

Or  would  dance  its  whimsical  shapes  on  the 
bluff  in  the  distance, 

Merrily  weaving  their  shadowy  whorls  to  the 
music  of  Lincoln  elected. 


THE  PEOPLE.  129 

See  a  new  hat  sail  into  the  fire — it  is  Squire 
Ebenezer  's, 

Flung  in  mad  fun  by  Trueblood  the  farmer, 
whose  palm-leaf  soon  follows, 

Even  the  dignified  beaver  of  grave  James 
Eutledge  whirls  whizzing 

Into  the  blazes — the  deed  of  rustic  respect- 
less  Rube  Ruffm; 

Fast  ran  the  jollification,  every  man  was  soon 
hatless — 

One  excepted  alone — and  he  was  Abraham 
Lincoln. 

Somebody  clutched  at  his  head,  but  he  dodged 
and  slid  into  darkness, 

Saving  his  Postoffice  hat  from  the  general 
conflagration 

For  the  sake  of  its  past,  but  also  for  sake  of 
its  future, 

Somehow  with  it  he  felt  himself  bonded  in 
soulship  forever, 

Duty  it  had  unfulfilled — a  letter  not  yet  de- 
livered. 


00k 


Lincoln  and  Ann  Rutledge. 

Clouded  the  dawn  of  the  morn  which  followed 

the  day  of  election ; 
Heaven  above  had  a  tear  in  her  eye,  unable 

to  shed  it, 
And  the  firmament    golden    had    suddenly 

turned  to  be  leaden. 
Light  drooped  down  to  the  earth  in  a  gloom 

bereft  of  its  sunshine, 
While  the  treetops  of  autumn,  song-rocked 

in  the  spring,  were  now  silent. 
Even  the  Sangamon  saucy  was  threading  the 

folds  of  his  valley 
Tuneless — unsounded  on  shoal  and  on  shore 

were  his  bantering  ripples, 
As  he  sulkily  slunk  through  the  grass  to  the 

all-purging  Ocean. 

(130) 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


Lincoln  arose  and  strode  through  the  village, 

throbbing  disquiet 
Which  interwove  in  his  soul  dark  strands 

with  a  bright  one  of  triumph. 
He  had  been  lifted  by  choice  of  the  folk  to 

their  temple  of  service, 
That  rejoiced  him  as  earnest  prophetic  of 

higher  fulfilment; 
But  underneath  the  feeling  triumphal  a  throb 

of  the  heart-break 
Pulsed  with  its  pain  to  the  nethermost  depths 

of  his  being; 
If  for  a  moment  on  victory's  upspring  he  rose 

to  a  tiptoe, 
Vengeful  melancholy  would  smite  him,  bow- 

ing him  earthward. 
So  he  staggered,  rising  and  falling  in  throes 

of  a  conflict 
Which  kept  rolling  in  surges  of  storm  his  soul 

and  his  body, 
Inner  peace  had  fled  e'en  if  he  was  outwardly 

victor. 


Such  was  the  struggle  far  deeper  than  any 

political  contest, 
Which  now  writhed  inside  him  with  fury  of 

dragons  contending. 
Lincoln,  the  lover  unpromised,  loves  her  who 

is  promised  another, 


132     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VII. 

Duty  makes  strife  with  his  passion  which  up- 
heaves him  in  heart-swells; 

He  is  bonded  in  word  to  search  for  his  rival 
now  absent, 

Whom  he  hopes  never  to  find  in  spite  of  the 
quest  he  is  making. 

Writing  a  pitiful  prayer  he  begs  in  fair 
phrases  an  answer, 

Which,  if  it  came  to  his  call,  he  could  cover 
with  love's  malediction. 

Thus  he  feels  himself  double,  and  double  the 
part  he  is  acting, 

Ever  unpraying  his  prayer  he  brands  himself 
a  dissembler. 

Conscience  bids  him  renounce,  but  his  heart 
keeps  smothering  conscience 

Which  stabs  back  in  the  dark  till  he  bleeds 
with  the  poignant  reproaches. 


So  it  comes  that  he  in  response  has  written 
another  epistle — 

That  was  the  unaddressed  letter,  yet  bearing 
the  sign  of  his  heart's  blood, 

Which  though  hid  in  his  bosom,  refuses  to 
be  there  imprisoned, 

But  leaps  forth  unexpected  to  light  as  if  seek- 
ing men's  eyesight, 

Hinting  some  message  unspoken  which  must 
in  time  be  delivered. 


LFNCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


This  is  the  letter  he  secretly  plans  to  give 

to  Ann  Butledge, 
When  the  moment  is  born,  instead  of  that  of 

the  lover. 


Wandering  lorn  and  alone  on  the  highway  he 
passes  tEe  mansion, 

Home  of  the  high-born  dame,  the  Lady  Eula- 
lia  Lovelace, 

Whom  he  knows  as  the  oracle  giving  her  help- 
ful responses — 

Sage  reconciler  of  all  the  sore  troubles  of 
heart  in  the  village. 

Harmony's  balsam  she  drops  divinely,  when- 
ever consulted, 

Healing  the  wounds  of  the  soul  from  her  wells 
of  deepest  experience. 

Lincoln  there  sighed  to  himself:  "Ah!  what 
can  she  do  in  my  crisis ! 

Dare  I  show  her  myself  in  this  heart-stamped 
letter  ensanguined!" 

But  he  could  not  enter  the  house  in  the  clash 
of  his  feelings, 

So  he  sped  up  the  road  to  walk  off  the  edge 
of  the  battle. 


Soon  he  had  strayed  to  the  mulberry  tree 
which  stood  at  the  roadside, 


134     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VII. 

Which  had  become  as  sacred  to  him  as  the 
oak  of  old  fable, 

From  whose  leaves  as  tongues  the  high  God 
would  whisper  responses, 

Giving  a  glimpse  of  the  future  to  the  inquisi- 
tive mortal. 

Lincoln  looked  up  at  the  foliage  searing  a  lit- 
tle in  autumn, 

With  a  foreboding  of  fate  whereof  he  knew 
not  the  reason. 


Soon  he  sat  down  on  the  settle  entwisted  of 

curls  of  the  grapevine, 
Which  there  seemed  to  embrace  him  in  many 

a  tangle  and  flexure. 
Then  he  talks  to  himself,  for  he  cannot  silence 

his  conflict: 
"She  the  loved  is  betrothed  to  another,  and 

well  do  I  know  it ! 
That  is  the  thought  which  knifes  me  in  two, 

that  knowledge !  0  knowledge ! 
Primal  curse  upon  man  at  his  start  in  the 

Garden  of  Eden ! 
My  beginning  of  life  it  is  too,  with  a  love  that 

is  hopeless — 
Yet  keeps  hoping  anew  and  haling  me  back 

to  my  trial ; 
For  she  disdains  me  not  in  her  heart,  she 

shows  me  her  favor. 


LINCOLN  2ND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.  105 

Duty  is  giving  her  one  command,  but  Love 

quite  another ; 
Shall  she  be  true  to  the  hest  of  her  heart,  or 

true  to  her  conscience! 
For  even  Truth  turns  double  and  pulls  her 

fiercely  asunder. 

In  its  full  fury  and  uproar  her  struggle  I  mir- 
ror within  me, 
For  it  is  mine— I  see  it  as  hers  but  I  feel  it 

as  mine  too — 
All  my  heart  to  a  demon  within  me  is  turned 

by  her  promise ; 
Love  too,  the  holiest  angel,  is  scourging  me 

down  to  damnation — 
What  I  ought  is  a  hammer  that  seems  to  be 

beating  my  brains  out. 
So  I  have  written  a  letter  which  tells  her  my 

renunciation, 
But  none  the  less  is  the  Hope  still  alive  that 

time  may  reward  it ; 
Love,  sweet  Love  I  write  down  renounced, 

obeying  stern  Conscience, 
Yet  the  counterstroke  slips  from  my  pen,  to 

renounce  my  renouncement. 
Let  me  read  once  more  that  script  of  a  sybil- 
line  leaflet." 


Lincoln  took  off  his  hat  and  gazed  at  the  heart 
on  the  letter 


136     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE.—BOOK  VII. 

Which  as  he  held  in  his  hand  was  trembling 
in  tune  to  his  pulse-waves, 

Letter  unsigned,  unaddressed,  undated,  per- 
chance too  unhappy, 

As  it  throbbed  with  a  pain  that  writhed  to  the 
tip  of  his  fingers, 

And  ran  wrenching  the  lines  of  his  face  to  the 
echoes  of  sorrow. 

When  he  had  read  the  letter  again  and  pon- 
dered each  sentence, 

Taking  the  oath  anew  to  fulfill  the  work  of 
renouncement — 

From  the  mulberry  top  down  fell  a  lone  leaf 
on  the  letter, 

Twirling  until  its  last  curve  on  the  ink-red 
token  alighted, 

Which  it  seemed  there  to  melt  with  in  kisses 
of  rapturous  silence. 


Up  he  sprang  from  his  seat  and  hastened 
away  from  that  leafage 

Which  in  a  thousand  mirrors  was  holding  be- 
fore him  his  image 

Borne  in  an  overflow  flooding  his  soul  -with 
frenzy  forebodeful. 

Past  the  round  red  schoolhouse  he  stepped 
with  memory  tender, 

As  he  thought  of  the  hours  he  spent  with  Ann 
Eutledge  in  study, 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


Where  their  heads  as  well  as  their  hearts 

grew  joined  in  a  marriage, 
Destined  to  stay  unfulfilled  to  the  law,  though 

the  tie  be  eternal, 
Which  in  his  mind  ran  back  to  that  day  when 

he  glimpsed  on  the  hillside 
First  the  fair  maid  as  he  sped  in  his  flatboat 

over  the  milldam. 


While  he  went  rocking  his  soul  in  the  cradle 
of  sweet  reminiscence, 

Just  then  struck  the  clear  bell  with  a  tremu- 
lous note  from  its  belfry 

Thrilling  the  air  into  throbs  sympathetic 
with  tender  emotions, 

As  it  called  the  loitering  children  to  school 
in  the  morning, 

Who  in  glad  groups  were  fain  to  prattle  and 
play  by  the  wayside. 

But  its  vanishing  thrills  seemed  to  chime 
with  his  mood  of  renouncement, 

Giving  a  toll  to  the  beat  of  his  heart  in  mem- 
ory tender. 


Mentor  Graham,  the  master,  was  there  and 

stood  on  the  doorstep 
Welcoming  all  with  a  swing  of  his  ferule,  the 

badge  of  his  empire, 


138     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VII. 

To  whom  Lincoln  nodded  salute  which  was 
hearty  and  grateful, 

But  not  mooded  he  was  to  stop  at  the  peda- 
gogue's challenge 

To  a  roistering  fable  about  his  triumphant 
election. 


Anxiously  onward  he  steps — he  hardly  dares 
dream  what  is  coming — 

Through  the  Public  Square,  along  its  diagonal 
cowpath, 

Stopping  to  glance  at  a  rifted  cloud  with  its 
downburst  of  sunshine, 

But  not  failing  to  fling  as  he  passed  a  glower- 
ing eye-shot 

At  the  store  of  Abner  the  absent  which  stood 
on  the  corner, 

And  appeared  to  be  woefully  waiting  in  watch 
for  the  owner. 

Soon  he  stood  under  the  sign  of  the  well- 
known  inn  of  the  village, 

Which  was  the  cheery  abode  of  James  Rut- 
ledge,  the  dignified  father, 

Ever  the  pride  of  citizens,  resident  first  of 
New  Salem. 


Lincoln  Halted  a  breath,  for  he  heard  palpitat- 
ing the  music 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE. 


139 


Sprung  of  the  shuttle  and  loom  in  the  dance 

of  their  rounded  recurrence, 
Weaving  in  cadence  the  web  and  the  warp  of 

a  garment  together; 
With  it  was  mingled  the  low  sweet  note  of 

the  voice  of  a  maiden 
Which  took  the  beat  of  its  time  from  the 

measuring  stroke  of  the  cross-beam, 
And  interwove  its  melody  tender  with  threads 

of  the  fabric. 
Well  did  the  listener  know  the  tune  and  the 

soft  intonation, 
Which  she  had  sung  him  in  many  a  soulful 

strain  of  a  ballad. 


Stepping  up  to  the  open  window  he  looked 

and  he  listened, 
While  in  his  bosom  was  smiting  a  loom  in 

heart-strokes  concordant, 
Weaving   destiny's   vesture   alive   with   the 

beats  of  the  future. 
Wistful  he  watches  the  sweep  of  her  arm  and 

the  swing  of  her  body 
As  she  forward  and  backward  bends  with  the 

dip  of  the  heddle, 
And  keeps  flinging  in  turn  and  return  the 

sharp-pointed  shuttle, 
Which  adds  line  upon  line  to  the  garment  in 

steady  procession ; 


140     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VII. 

Fleetly  the  bobbin  is  flying  bird-like  in  the 

sway  of  the  branches, 
From  one  side  to  the  other  is  streaming  a 

thread  in  its  mouth-piece, 
As  the  maid  catches  its  flight  in  her  hand  and 

whips  it  around  thence 
So  that  it  leaves  in  its  trail  a  filament  spun 

of  its  body, 
Like  Arachne  the  spider  who  spins  her  fine 

gossamer  network 
Out  of  herself  in  long  lines  that  cross  in  her 

intricate  pattern. 


Lincoln  hearkened  the  stroke  of  the  loom  beat 

time  to  her  ditty 
Weaving  her  musical  soul  along  with  each 

thread  of  the  garment ; 
Bowing  her  head  to  her  work  she  seemed  to 

be  saying  her  prayer. 
Up  and  down  lilts  the  warp  as  if  tuned  to 

the  tread  of  the  dancer 
Going  and  coming  in  mazes  of  texture  with 

harmony  woven, 
While  in  the  shuttle  is  humming  the  spool  cut 

of  hollowed  elder. 


Sadly  was  sighing  the  lay  of  the  maid  as  if 
she  were  singing 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


Her  own  tragical   love    and   the    desperate 

struggle  within  her, 
Weaving  her  life-threads  one  by  one,  with 

each  cast  of  the  shuttle, 
Making  a  tissue  that  seemed  to  be  woven  of 

matter  and  spirit. 


Suddenly  tapped  the  schoolhouse  bell  a  toll 

to  her  measure, 
Causing  her  hand  to  miss  in  its  grip  the  dart 

of  the  shuttle, 
As  she  called  up  the  past  of  her  heart  on  the 

way  to  the  present. 


Then  a  moment  she  stopped  and  looked  at  the 

ring  on  her  finger, 
For  it  had  caught,    as    she    jerked,  in  the 

strands  of  the  garment, 
Seemingly  seeking  to  stem  the  dexterous  work 

of  the  weaver, 
Jealous  of  what  the  finger  and  hand  were 

busily  making, 
As  they  rapidly  hurtled  the  warp  and  the 

woof  to  a  fabric. 

Even  she  tried  one  tug  to  pull  off  the  obsti- 
nate token 
Which  still  clug  to  its  place,  refusing  to  slip 

by  the  knuckle. 


142    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VII. 

Deeply  she  sighed  as  she  sundered  the  thread 
from  the  ring  which  had  caught  it, 

Muttering:  "Ah,  methinks  my  shroud  this 
day  I  am  weaving!" 


Lincoln  heard  it  and  uttered  a  sob  as  he  stood 
at  the  window, 

While  the  heart  in  his  bosom  hit  loud  on  its 
walls  as  a  drum-beat, 

And  there  rolled  down  his  cheek  in  spite  of 
himself  tEe  hot  tear-ball, 

For  he  seemed  to  presage  the  maiden's  trag- 
edy coming, 

And  to  weep  at  the  dream  of  her  fate  which 
her  lips  had  forespoken. 


But  Ann  Rutledge  had  heard  in  response  the 

low  sough  of  his  breathing, 
Quickly  she  whirled  round  her  head  to  the 

source  of  that  deep  suspiration, 
Catching  the  lines  of  his  face  at  the  throb  of 

their  tristful  emotion ; 
Well  she  knew  the  sad  mood  of  the  man  and 

the  gloom  of  his  nature, 
Knew  how  to  turn  it  aside  to  the  fanciful  play 

of  his  humor 
Putting  a  mask  of  joy  on  a  soul  overborne 

with  its  sorrow. 


LINCOLN  AtfD  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


Up  she  sprang  from  the  stool  of  her  loom 

with  countenance  smile-lit, 
Pouring  the  balm  of  her  look  she  tripped  to 

the  face  at  the  window, 
And  with  the  sunshine  born  of  a  word  she 

scattered  the  rain-cloud: 
'  i  Well,  you  peeper  !  So  you  have  come  to  spy 

out  my  secret  ! 
Always  trying  to  read  just  what  I  keep  in 

me  unspoken  ! 
Always  trying  to  hear  the  unheard  of  my 

heart  in  its  secret  ! 
But  now  tell  me,  does  not  my  handiwork  seem 

to  you  happy  ? 
For  I  was  happy  in  doing  it,  weaving  myself 

to  this  raiment; 
You  too  can  fabric  yourself  in  a  story  —  give 

me  a  sample." 


Such  was  the  shift  of  her  sunlit  soul  from  a 
cloud  to  a  rainbow. 

Instantaneous  with  Love's  look  from  sympa- 
thy's well-head 

Over  the  face  of  Lincoln  a  humorous  wavelet 
ran  trickling: 

"Yes,  I  must  be  a  weaver,  a  fable  I  often 
have  woven, 

Out  of  the  Black  Hawk  War,  on  the  loom  of 
my  fancy  romantic, 


144     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VII. 

And  I  see  that  you  too  have  been  dipped  in 

the  spirit  of  fabling. 
But  relate  to  me  now  your  secret — the  nub  of 

your  story." 


Luminous,  Ann  responded,  noting  the  change 

in  his  features : 
"I  shall  tell  it  at  once — this  garment  I  weave 

is  for  you,  sir, 
Given  by  father  and  mother  and  me  in  your 

honor's  election, 
To  be  used  for  a  new  suit  of  clothes  when  you 

leave  for  Vandalia, 
Where  will  begin  your  mount  on  the  ladder  or 

lofty  ambition ; 
How  will  the  title  resound  through  the  world 

» — the  Hon'rable  Abraham  Lincoln  I " 


Thus  she  meeded  him  praises,  summoning  all 

of  her  sunshine 
That  she  might  gently  illumine  the  clouds 

which  had  lowered  in  Lincoln, 
For  she  long  had  been  ware,  in  the  feel  of  her 

soul,  of  the  night-spell 
Which  had  been  laid  on  his  life,  perchance  in 

the  womb  of  his  mother, 
And  still  more,  had  been  wrought  in  the  look 

of  the  fate-eyed  frontiersman, 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


Ever  foreboding  the  danger  which  loomed 

from  the  wreak  of  the  savage. 
Such  was  the  rill  of  his  character  trickling 

from  fountain  ancestral, 
Which  the  maiden  knew  how  to  transform  to 

an  overflow  sunny, 
Making  him  glow  when  gloomed,  by  a  dip  in 

the  sheen  of  her  spirit.  j 


Slowly  to  his  drew  nearer  her  eyes  and 
warmed  to  a  sparkle, 

Tender  the  whisper  she  lipped,  and  worded 
in  tones  confidential: 

"I  was  thinking  of  you  with  every  shot  of 
the  shuttle, 

At  each  shift  of  the  warp  I  saw  a  tall  form 
in  new  raiment, 

Thoughts  of  mine  own  would  run  of  them- 
selves into  lines  of  the  texture, 

And  this  loom  has  woven  you  too  with  the 
yarn  of  the  spinner. 

But  behold !  at  the  image  within  me  I  looked 
through  the  window, 

When  the  face  of  my  fancy  shot  into  the  face 
here  before  me 

With  a  sudden  fulfilment  of  hope  which  baf- 
fles me  dreaming." 

Then  she  lit  up  her  look  with  radiance  fresh 
of  her  soulshine. 


146     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VII. 

Buoyantly  swayed  on  her  smiles  rose  Lincoln 
out  of  his  sorrow 

Layered  within  him  far  down  in  the  bottom- 
less sea  of  his  being; 

Yet  she  too  had  her  sorrow,  surging  in  con- 
flict ferocious, 

Hers  was  a  running  fight  underneath  her 
pleasant  exterior 

Waged  between  her  unpromised  love  and  her 
unloved  promise; 

Chained  to  the  loveless  law  is  the  lawless  love 
in  each  heart-throb, 

Which  at  the  presence  of  Lincoln  smote  her 
more  fiercely  than  ever. 


But  the  youth  was  illumined  with  new  light 

that  streamed  through  his  features, 
And  he  spake  forth  his  radiant  mood  in  an 

eager  inquiry : 
"What  do  you  say  you  are  weaving?    Tell 

me  concerning  this  garment — 
Suit  of  fine  clothes  bran-new  you  people  are 

going  to  give  me ! 
Strangely  forefelt!  it  is  just  what  I  needed 

and  secretly  longed  for. 
Such  a  providence  takes  off  the  scowl  of  high 

Heaven  down  at  me. '  ' 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


To  him  responded  the  maid  sympathetic  in 

voice  and  in  eye-glance  : 
"All  of  us  thought  the  new  dress  you  must 

have  to  bespeak  the  new  calling, 
For  your  career  now  takes  its  first  stride  to 

the  goal  of  the  future, 
Passing  from  little  New  Salem  on  up  to  the 

State,  to  the  Nation, 
Oft  have  I  seen  in  my  dream  your  steps  to 

the  top  of  the  mountain  ; 
Our  whole  household  has  shared  in  the  joy 

of  weaving  this  garment. 
'Tis  a  month  since  I  started,  forecasting  that 

you  would  be  chosen  — 
See  !  it  is  done  —  but  two  threads  more  are  all 

that  are  needed, 
Those  I  shall  add  just  now  while  you  look  at 

me  throwing  the  shuttle." 


Then  she  sprang  to  her  seat  and  played  on 
her  loom  a  sweet  music, 

Only  two  notes  of  the  strain  whose  measures 
had  built  the  whole  fabric, 

While  each  thread  of  the  texture  was  woven 
along  with  a  heart-beat. 

"Finished!"  she  cried  in  a  joy,  to  a  bolt  she 
wound  up  her  labor, 

Talking  meanwhile  to  the  wonder-smit  coun- 
tenance peeking  before  her : 


148     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOE  TIL 

1 l  This  is  what  we  are  going  to  send  to  the  vil- 
lage's  tailor, 

To  the  crosslegged  Sandy,  skillfully  plying 
his  needle, 

Shearing  and  stitching  and  pressing  his  flat- 
iron  hot  on  his  lapboard." 


Then  she  turned  and  faced  intently  the  youth 

at  the  window, 
Drawing  her  look  to  a  question  which  seemed 

to  wish  "  no  "  for  an  answer : 
"Have  you  brought  me  today  the  letter  a  long 

time  expected?" 
Ere  he  could  utter  a  word,  his  hat  she  had 

daintily  lifted — 
Luckless  rent-free  Postoffice  hat,  which  she 

knew  as  his  mail-bag — 
When  down  flitted  that  unaddressed  letter  of 

Fate  with  its  token, 
To  the  surprise  of  the  maid,  as  Lincoln  spake 

out  the  presage : 
"There  it  drops  out  again!    The  secret  can 

never  be  hidden ! 
Thrice  it  has  sped  to  the  sight,  defying  my 

every  precaution, 
And  has  revealed  the  full  heart  to  the  eye  in 

symbol  of  red-ink. 
By  myself  I  dared  not  give  it,  but  Heaven 

now  helps  me. 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUT  LEDGE. 


Take  it,  'tis  written  to  you,  but  not  by;  your 

absentee  Abner." 
Ann  for  a  moment  was  startled,  feeling  the 

cut  of  her  conflict, 
As  the  youth  let  fall  on  her  palm  the  weird- 

working  token, 
Saying:    "You  need  not  answer  it  till  I  re- 

turn from  Vandalia, 
And  expect  not  a  line  till  you  see  me  appear- 

ing in  person; 
To  renounce  is  my  word  which  I  solemnly  lip 

in  my  vow  here." 


But  soon  Lincoln  unkeyed  to  his  love  the 

tense  turn  of  his  features, 
And  with  the  look  of  a  hope  he  preluded  his 

purpose  more  gently: 
"I  shall  write  once  a  week  to  the  Lady  Eula- 

lia  Lovelace 
Who  is  the  friend  of  us  both,  and  also  deft 

mender  of  heart-break; 
Till  then  renounce,  and  with  you  so  pledged 

I  shall  have  to  renounce  too. 
You  were  strong  when  you  passed  by  the  mul- 
berry shunning  my  presence, 
Just  as  strong  I  am  trying  to  be  and  fulfill 

your  example, 
Then  the  days  will  bring  the  reward  of  our 

double  renouncement. " 


150     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLED'GE.—BOOK  VII. 

So  he  spake,  and  would  give  up  the  present 
in  hope  of  the  future. 


But  just  look  at  the  blush  of  the  maiden  as 
she  clings  to  the  letter 

With  a  deep  sudden  sough  of  her  breath, 
which  was  pulsed  with  her  heart-beats 

Throwing  out  on  the  air  the  shock  of  her  in- 
nermost conflict! 

Then  she  pressed  to  her  quivering  lips  that 
symbol  of  red-ink, 

Quite  as  if  she  might  dare,  in  the  fire  of  her 
feeling,  to  kiss  it. 

Lincoln  leaned  forward,  perchance  to  bestead 
the  sweet  lot  of  that  letter, 

But  he  saw  on  her  raised-up  hand  the  red 
wrath  of  the  ruby 

Flashing  out  like  a  blood-shot  eye  from  the 
ring  of  betrothal ; 

At  the  implacable  image  of  anger  he  shudder- 
ing shrank  back, 

Dropping  his  visage  to  earth  in  the  glance  of 
the  flame-eyed  demon. 


There  they  stood  heart-struck  apart,  the  ring 
was  a  Hell-fire  between  them, 

Silent  they  stared  as  it  were  on  the  brink  of 
the  chasm  infernal, 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


When  down  dropped  on  their  hideous  dream 

the  voice  of  the  school-bell, 
Calling  them  back  to  themselves  for  fulfilling 

the  work  of  renouncement. 
Each  turned  away  from  the  other  in  spite  of 

their  mutual  longing, 
Hopefully  waiting  for  time  to  resolve  the  lorn 

strife  of  their  love-sighs  ; 
Still  they  both  peeped  backward,  each  looked 

at  the  other  while  looking. 


I00K 


Vandalia. 

Now  behold  on  the  road  to  the  Capital  Abra- 
ham Lincoln, 

Leaving    New    Salem    behind,    afoot    he    is 
threading  the  country 

Whose  expanse  is   rolling  beyond  and  be- 
yond in  the  distance, 

Carrying  upward  and  onward  his  ken  into 
dreams  of  the  future, 

Till  in  the  welkin  above  him  he  sees  the  high 
dome  of  the  Nation 

Bending  around  the  horizon  which  drops  sun- 
lit to  the  prairie, 

And  encircles  each  step  with  a  heaven  of  far- 
glancing  glory, 

Even    the    threatening    cloud-wrack    would 

flash  into  fleeces  of  gold-wool. 
(152) 


VANDALIA. 


153 


Oft  he  inspects  the  new  suit  of  which  he  is 
wearer  triumphant, 

Smoothing  it  over  the  nap  with  his  hand 
caressingly  gentle, 

Watchfully  picking  away  from  its  surface 
each  gossamer  stranded, 

Each  wrecked  cobweb  idly  afloat  in  the  sea 
of  the  sunbeams, 

For  his  happiest  hope  was  to  keep  the  gar- 
ment still  flawless 

Till  he  returned  from  his  trip  in  the  bloom  of 
the  Spring  to  New  Salem, 

Love  was  secretly  wound  in  each  thread,  love- 
spun  and  love-woven. 

Loftily  in  his  new  vesture  he  trod  a  new  man 
down  the  highway, 

Newly  aware  of  himself,  beginning  anew  his 
career  too ; 

Even  a  strut  now  and  then  he  would  stride,  in 
ambition  exalted. 


Still  he  kept  turning  around  for  a  glance  at 
the  village  receding 

Till  it  swooned  out  of  view  in  the  arms  of  the 
wooing  horizon, 

When  it  left  him  alone  to  himself  in  a  fare- 
well of  silence. 

Hark!  it  still  has  a  tremulous  voice,  though 
vanished  from  vision ! 


154   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VIII. 

'Tis  the  bell  of  the  schoolhouse  breathing  the 

lisp  of  its  tinkle 
In  its  low  breath  which  throbs  on  his  ear  for 

a  moment,  then  dies  there, 
Quite  unable  to  pulse  a  beat  farther  across  the 

mid  air-sea, 
Bearing  a  message  of  love  which  startles  his 

soul's  reminiscence, 
As  he  dreams  that  he  hears  the  last  sigh  of 

a  maid  in  the  whisper 
Faintingly  to  him  syllabled  from  the  invisible 

belfry, 
For  the  dark  backstroke  of  Fate  smote  in  him 

amid  all  his  joyance, 
Just  from  the  depths  of  his  love  overflowed 

him  the  forecast  of  losing. 


Autumn  has  ripened  the  round  of  the  seasons 

to  fullness  of  fruitage, 
Shimmering  into   the   sun-beshone  hours  a 

sense  of  fulfilment. 
Still  the  yellowing  year  hath  a  yearning  for 

something  beyond  it, 

Even  the  day  in  decline  doth  whisper  a  long- 
ing immortal, 
And  the  set  of  one  sun  is  felt  as  the  rise  of 

another. 

Time  itself  this  moment  must  die  to  re-live 
the  next  moment. 


VANDALIA. 


155 


Lincoln  was  sauntering  slowly  along  in  the 

mood  of  the  autumn 
Which  was  playing  its  tints  on  his  soul  like 

the  vanishing  rainbow, 
When  he  was  suddenly  met  at  the  crossing  by 

one  of  his  voters, 
Best  of  the  neighboring  farmers,  who  then 

started  to  quiz  him : 
"So  our  lawmaker  lofty  is  off  for  the  halls 

of  Vandalia, 
Which  lies  dreamily  muddy  along  the  low 

banks  of  Kaskaskia, 
Weening  itself  already  the  Capital  true  of 

the  Nation. 
But,  good  Abraham,  fetch  me  at  once  that 

railroad  of  iron 

With  its  horse  to  skip  fleetly  across  my  lob- 
lolly prairie, 
That  I  may  give  up  my  oxcart  and  quit  so 

much  walking. 
I  would  like  if  it  ran  just  in  front  of  the  door 

of  my  cabin; 
Anyhow  keep  it  away,  for  my  vote,  from  the 

farm  of  Jake  Jaggers." 


Such  was  the  name  of  a  neighbor  and  rival 

he  spitefully  spat  out. 
Artfully  Lincoln  switched  off  to  a  story  in 

giving  his  answer : 


156   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VIII. 

"Let  me  now  tell  you  what  I  am  thinking 

about  on  this  journey: 
That  whole  Capital  I  am  propounding  to 

scoop  at  an  armful, 
And  to  carry  it  off  to  the  banks  of  the  San- 

gamon  river, 
Where  it  rightly  belongs  if  we  list  to  the 

voice  of  our  county ; 
Yea,  my  New  Salem  would  never  refuse  the 

gift  of  the  State-house." 


On  sped  the  speaker  leaving  his  voter  to  pon- 
der the  problem. 

Often  he  shifted  around  in  his  mind  his  law- 
giving  burden, 

Thinking  how  he  might  knit  the  whole  State 
in  the  knot  of  new  union, 

Tieing  it  through  and  through  with  the  iron- 
bound  tracks  of  the  railroad, 

Bringing  more  closely  together  its  people  in 
commerce  and  travel. 

Also  he  peered  in  the  rift  which  ran  through 
the  heart  of  the  Nation, 

Which  made  of  one  two  peoples  that  started 
to  facing  each  other, 

Still  united,  but  quaked  with  uncanny  fore- 
boding of  struggle, 

Which  already  was  stamped  on  his  soul  pre- 
saging the  future. 


VANDALIA. 


157 


Aye  that  pedestrian  silently  faring  ahead  on 
the  highway, 

Saw  around  the  horizon  the  far  heat-light- 
ning in  flashes, 

Which,  unvoiced  of  the  thunder,  seemed  deed- 
less  caresses  of  fancy; 

Or  at  night  the  star-shot  welkin  would  fling 
him  a  fire-ball 

Suddenly  over  the  sky,  illuming  the  firma- 
ment's arches, 

Torching  terrestrial  ways  for  a  minute,  then 
blaze  into  nothing. 


But  the  strife  which  moiled  in  his  mind  most 

often  and  deeply, 
Came  of  the  Furies  of  Love  which  kept 

wrenching  his  heart  as  two  wrestlers 
In    their     desperate     combat,     dragon-like, 

twisted  together. 
Love's  deepest  truth  in  his  being  becomes 

what  assails  the  Law's  sanction, 
Yet  he  the  Lawmaker  is  for  others,  aye  for 

himself  too. 
What  he  owns  in  every  droplet  of  blood  of  his 

body 
Cannot  be  his  by  the  right  of  the  world  but 

belongs  to  another ; 
What  in  nature  is  one  and  the  whole,  stays 

halved  and  asunder. 


158   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE.—BOOK  VIT1. 

Think  what  may  happen  while  he  is  away 

in  the  distant  Vandalia ! 
Winged  by  Chance  the  letter  expected  may 

drop  any  moment ; 
Then  sad  Ann  would  behold  as  the   signs 

of  her  innermost  combat 
Two  contending  writs,  each  making  the  claim 

of  possession. 
Or  the  absenter  himself  might  appear  and 

take  up  his  promise ! 
Thus  the  lone  wayfarer  tossed  on  the  wave* 

of  his  soul  in  a  tempest, 
Seeking  to  fathom  the  oracles  dark  of  the 

deeds  that  are  coming. 


Now  at  a  farm-house  facing  the  roadside  he 

asks  for  his  dinner ; 
Which    the    generous    owner,    guest-loving, 

heartily  offers. 
Lincoln  had  soon,  from  his  place  on  the  porch, 

peered  in  at  a  window 
Whence  he  had  heard  the  sound  of  a  loom  in 

weaving  a  garment; 

Where  on  a  stool  sat  the  daughter  busily  ply- 
ing her  shuttle, 
With  the  same  bend  of  the  head,  and  graceful 

cast  of  the  forearm, 
Which  he  had  seen  once  before  when  he 

peeped  at  the  beautiful  weaver, 


VANDALIA. 


While  she  wove  with  body  and  soul  the  gar- 

ment he  wore  now. 
Even  the  look  seemed  the  same  recalling  in 

rapture  her  image; 
As  he  stood  in  a  silence  steadily  eyeing  the 

window, 
He  was  waked  from  his  dream  by  a  call  to 

partake  of  the  viands, 
Which  he  did  with  a  relish,  oft  adding  the 

sauce  of  a  story. 


Finished  with  luck  the  good  dinner,  thriftily 

spoke  up  the  farmer: 
"Acres  of  corn  are  now  ripe  awaiting  the  cut 

of  the  corn-hook, 

Frost  has  bitten  it  gently,  today  we  are  start- 
ing to  shock  it ; 
How  all  the  ears  of  the  stalks  have  suddenly 

shifted  their  color, 
From  their  suits  of  fresh  velvety  green  to  a 

butternut  fading! 
And  the  red  tassels  so  silken  and  soft  that 

waved  in  the  sunshine 
Like  a  fiery  bandanna  hung    out    from   its 

pocket  of  corn-shucks, 
Are  burnt  crumbling  and  crisp  to  the  touch, 

and  sere  to  the  eye-sight; 
Also  some  ears,  the  best  of  the  crop,  we  shall 

strip  for  a  hoe-cake, 


160   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VIII. 

For  the  roasting-ear's  kernel  now  hardens 

upon  the  last  nubbin." 
When  he  heard  of  the  husking-bee  Lincoln 

rejoiced  as  a  victor, 
For  as  lawmaker  knew  he  far  less  of  his  craft 

than  as  husker, 
Though  another  sly  motive  he  had  which  he 

hid  in  his  bosom. 
So  Ee  asked  of  the  farmer  to  take  him  along 

to  the  cornfield, 
Modestly  saying  this  word  of  himself:  "I 

think  I  can  help  you." 


All  then  jollily  started  away  to  the  trial  of 

labor ; 
Lincoln  first  shucked  off  his  coat  and  his  vest 

from  himself  like  a  corn-ear, 
Carefully  folding  and  laying  these  garments 

bran-new  on  a  fence-rail; 
But  the  new  trousers  he  could  not  so  easily 

save  from  the  ordeal. 
Then  he  took  the  curved  cutter  and  slashed 

away  at  a  corn-hill — 
Four  large  stalks  it  contained  overarching 

him  under  their  leaf-blades ; 
Each  of  the  stalks  bore  two  ears  of  corn  and 

perchance  a  wee  nubbin, 
But  he  severed  them  all  at  one  cut  .of  the 

keen  crescent  corn-hook. 


VANDALIA. 


161 


Gripping  their  tops  and  thrusting  them  into 

the  shock  by  the  handful. 
Then  he  clasped  on  his  long  middle  finger  the 

thong  of  tough  leather 
Which  would  fasten  the  husking  peg  cut  of  a 

hickory  sapling 
Tapering   down   to    a   point   to   pierce   the 

rough  husk  of  the  corn-ear, 
Till  the  serried  lines  of  gold  grains  would 

flash  in  the  sunlight 
Massed  in  phalanxes  close  round  the  cob  in 

the  shape  of  a  spindle. 


So  the  ears  kept  flying  to  heaps  from  the 

hands  of  the  huskers, 
Till  the  supper-horn  blew  its  sweet  welcoming 

note  from  the  farm-house 
Making  a  music  softly  attuned  to  the  glow  of 

the  sunset, 
Hurrying  hungry  huskers  to  frugal  fare  of 

the  farmer, 
Mush  and  milk  as  the  vanguard,  then  hominy 

hulled  and  the  bacon, 
Crowned  with  a  fry  of  young  chicken  that 

swam  in  a  sea  of  cream  gravy. 

Ended  the  meal  well-seasoned  with  humorous 
bits  of  the  backwoods, 


162   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VlII. 

Lincoln  addressed  the  daughter  and  begged 

for  a  tune  on  her  fiddle, 
Namely  the  loom  with  its  bow  and  its  strings 

strung  tense  to  be  played  on, 
Tapping  the  harmonies  held  in  his  heart  by 

the  mode  of  its  music, 
Thrilling  the  halls  of  memory's  temple  with 

images  happy 

Which  restore  the  whole  world  of  New  Sa- 
lem's  beautiful  weaver 
Re-enacting  the  glint  of  her  eyes  and  the  lisp 

of  her  lips  too. 
This  was  the  reason  why  Lincoln  had  stayed 

and  swinked  in  the  cornfield. 
Fain  would  he  witness  in  life  once  more  his 

heart's  fondest  drama 
Played  by  the  daughter  before  him  attuning 

the  loom  and  the  shuttle. 


So  he  re-lived  in  that  farm-house  the  sweet- 
est scene  of  existence 

For  awhile,  when  a  rap  was  heard  and  a 
tread  on  the  doorstep ; 

Bidden  by  guestship  to  enter,  a  stranger 
walked  in  out  the  night-tide, 

As  the  good  farmer  held  up  the  candle  but 
uttered  no  question, 

Then  the  newcomer  spoke:  "I  am  trudging 
my  way  to  Vandalia, 


VANDALIA. 


163 


Chosen  lawgiver  for  the  whole  State  from 

Montgomery  County, 
Dimmed  by  the  dark  and  weary  of  footstep  I 

ask  a  night's  lodgment." 
Hesitating  the  farmer  replied  as  if  forced 

to  refusal: 
''Here  we  have  but  one  bed  for  a  guest,  and 

that  is  now  taken." 
Lincoln  then  broke  in  suddenly:     "We  can 

lie  under  one  cover; 
Friend,  I  too  am  bound  for  Vandalia,  going 

to-morrow, 
Tall  representative  cornstalk  grown  in  the 

Sangamon  Valley. 
Possibly  we  shall  agree  on  some  law  as  we 

talk  in  our  slumber, 
And  I  would  like  to  be  winning  a  vote  for  my 

railroad  beforehand." 
"Yes,   but   mine   is  a  heavier  burden  than 

that,"  said  the  stranger. 


Both  lay  down  underneath  one  bed-quilt,  the 

best  of  the  household — 
Only  last  week  it  was  merrily  stitched  at  a 

neighborhood  quilting — 
Both  of  the  lawgivers  soon  were  in  mutual 

harmony  snoring, 
Worn  with  the  work  of  the  day  they  enter  the 

portal  of  dreamland 


164   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTL'EDGE.—BOOK  VIII. 

Where  is  still  living  their  past,  oft  mingling 
with  shapes  of  the  future. 


One  of  the  sleepers  heard  lisped  a  faint  word 
from  a  voice  of  his  dreamf oik : 

"Soon  I  shall  be  but  a  ghost,  yet  to  stay  in 
thy  presence  forever." 


With  that  voice  still  haunting  his  ears  rose 

Lincoln  at  daybreak, 
Strolled  about  on  the  porch,  then  looked  at 

the  loom  through  the  window. 
Soon  the  wife  of  the  farmer,  forethoughtful, 

had  ready  their  breakfast, 
To  whose  homely  fare  was  added  the  fry  of 

some  hen's  eggs, 
Nor  did  she  fail  to  give  them  a  slice  of  her 

ham  from  the  smoke-house- 
Delicate  beechnut  ham,  the  best  of  the  flesh 

of  the  porker. 

Both  of  the  guests  partook,  and  paid  their  re- 
spects to  the  hostess, 
Who  well  knew  how  to  serve  her  food  with  a 

flavor  domestic. 
Briskly  together  they  started  to  step  off  the 

way  to  Vandalia, 
Law-making  seat  of  the  State,  which  hovered 

a  day  in  the  distance. 


TANDALIA. 


First  the  companion  spoke  up  to  Lincoln  who 

lagged  absent-minded  : 
"Twice  already  a  member,  I  now  am  going 

the  third  time  — 
Here    in    my    knapsack    are    well-thumbed 

pages  of  print  you  should  know  of  : 
Jefferson's  manual  showing  the  order  which 

guides  our  Assembly; 
Two  Constitutions,  of  State  and  of  Nation,  I 

always  keep  by  me, 
They  are  the  rock  on  which  the  true  patriot 

has  to  stay  anchored." 


"With  a  knock  of  surprise  was  Lincoln  jerked 

out  of  his  dream-world, 
For  the  man  now  spoke  like  a  sage  of  expe- 
rience and  learning, 
As  he  pulled  off  his  coon-skin  cap  with  tails 

ornamented, 
And  unbuttoned   to   freedom   of  speech  his 

checkered  shirt-collar. 
Then  the  philosopher  clad  in  the  style  of  the 

backwoods,  gave  answer 
Why  he  had  quit  the  civilized  world  to  dwell 

on  the  border : 
"I  was  born  in  Virginia,  near-by  stood  famed 

Monticello, 
Known  as  Jefferson's  temple,  sacred  to  all 

his  disciples, 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE.—BOOK  VIII. 


One  of  whom  I  was  in  youth,  and  today  I  do 

not  deny  him. 
But  a  good  dozen  years  have  sped  since  I  fled 

from  my  birthland, 
Feeling  a  doom  suspended  above  it  and  des- 

tined to  light  there. 
So  I  began  with  thousands  of  others  the  toil- 

some migration 
To  this  spacious  North-  West,  by  Jefferson 

dowered  with  freedom. 
Yet  I  fear  lest  we  may  in  this  State  have 

trouble  to  keep  it." 


Quickly  a  look  sympathetic  shot  out  of  the 
eye-balls  of  Lincoln, 

As  the  man  uttered  his  heart  in  words  that 
fell  saddened  by  forecast. 

Meantime  they  stopped  at  the  cross-roads 
reading  a  sign-board, 

When  on  one  of  the  centering  ways  came  roll- 
ing a  carriage ; 

In  it  was  seated  a  gentleman  dignified,  lofty 
in  presence 

Like  a  cavalier  cloaked  and  hatted,  and  some- 
what ringleted  also; 

High  on  the  seat  in  front  was  perched  the 
bred  darkey  as  driver. 

Stately  the  man  in  the  carriage  nodded  to 
Lincoln's  companion 


VANDALIA. 


167 


Whom  he  well  knew,  for  both  had  been  mak- 
ers of  law  at  Vandalia. 

Aristocratic  he  glanced  at  the  footmen,  and 
rather  disdainful, 

He  too  wore  a  new  suit,  but  cut  to  the  fashion 
of  Richmond. 


When  he  had  whirled  in  his  vehicle  by  them, 

began  the  companion: 
''That  is  the  man  who  tried  and  yet  tries  to 

make  us  a  Slave-State, 
But  we  thwarted  him — still  we  may  have  to 

meet  him  this  session — 
Honest  I  hold  him,  he  never  would  sell  out 

his  honor  for  money, 
Though  for  what  I  then  did,  he  shows  me  a 

grudge  in  his  bearing ; 
Did  you  not  notice  it?  Yet  he  too  was  born  in 

Virginia, 
Not  many  miles  from  the  shrine  Monticello, 

the  center  of  Statesmen, 
Also  he  claims  to  uphold  the  true  Jeffersonian 

doctrine. 
But  I  came  from  the  opposite  side  of  the 

same  Monticello." 


In  a  pause  of  reflection,  Lincoln  then  picked 
up  the  discourse: 


163   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOR  VIII. 

"Also  my  fathers  were  born  of  that  State 

and  its  character  twofold : 
Oft  I  have  wondered  at  the  two  doctrines 

which  sprang  from  her  mind-world, 
Opposites  quite ;  and  she  bore  two  sets  of  po- 
litical children — 
These  new  States  of  the  West,  all  born  of 

Mother  Virginia, 
For  example  our  Illinois  here,  and  yonder 

Kentucky — " 
But  the  philosopher  whirling,  broke  in  with 

gesture  emphatic: 
"Friend,  Virginia  is  halved,  deep-cleft  with 

a  line  of  division 
Down  in  her  soul — her  land  even  seems  to  me 

now  to  lie  double ; 
Parent  of  States  half  black  half  white,  half 

slave  but  half  free  too, 
List  what  is  doomful,  half  union  her  faith  yet 

half  separation. 
And  her  great  men  are  dual  inside,  though 

much  do  I  love  them; 
That  is  the  birthmark  of  Fate  which  they 

show  in  their  doing  and  thinking. 
Not  alone  on  the  man  is  it  stamped,  but  on 

State  and  Nation." 

The  philosopher  took  up  his  gait,  slow-step- 
ping, reflective : 


VANDALIA. 


'  '  Truly  methinks  I  now  see  my  exemplar,  my 

Jefferson  also 
Is  composed  of  two  opposite  strains  inter- 

woven, colliding, 
Yet  the  people  are  such  too,  and  that  is  our 

destiny's  riddle.'* 

Peripatetic  the  sage  revealed  himself  still 

in  his  life-lines 
As  he  gave  with  a  sigh  the  last  turn  to  his 

heart-  felt  reflection  : 
"Once  we  had  hoped  to  break  every  fetter 

within  our  Dominion, 
But  the  Compromise  passed  and  we  quit  the 

old  home  for  new  freedom, 
As  did  thousands  and  thousands,  and  still 

they  are  coming  by  thousands 
On  all  the  roads  that  branch  to  the  prairies 

and  woods  of  the  North-West. 
Jefferson's  domain  I  call  it,  the  seat  of  a  new 

liberation  — 
Yonder  already  they  come"  —  as  he  spoke,  he 

triumphantly  pointed 
To  a  white  serpentine  train  many-jointed  of 

round-covered  wagons 
Winding  about  through  the  limitless  level  of 

grassy  prairie. 


170   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VIII. 

But  see  the  Capital  lying  along  the  sluggish 

Kaskaskia, 
Sunning  itself  on  the  mud-made  banks  in  a 

hundred  log  cabins 
Of  the  frontiersmen,  all  of  them  ready  to 

wing  away  westward, 
Over  the  roiled    Mississippi    and    over    the 

snaggy  Missouri, 
And  still  farther  ahead  to  the  threatening 

spurs  of  the  Rockies 
Flying  above  the  others  and  lighting  adown 

on  the  front  line, 

Like  the  swirl  of  a  covey  of  blackbirds  round- 
ing the  grainfield, 
Whirling  over  the  ground  in  turn  upon  turn 

as  a  roller, 
For  the  last  will  be  first  when  the  first  has 

been  left  as  the  last  one. 

Even  the  Capital  seemed  to  be  ready  to  quit 
its  foundation, 

As  if  eager  to  rise  on  the  wing  and  take  pass- 
age elsewhither, 

Quite  uncertain  of  stay  in  the  dowerless  town 
of  Vandalia 

Which  now  Lincoln  beheld,  with  a  tale  on  his 
tongue  as  he  entered ; 

This,  however,  he  told  not,  finding  just  then 
not  a  hearer, 


VANDALIA. 


171 


Grave  legislators   were   coming   each  hour, 

well-shotted  with  speeches. 
Many  a  member  had  borne  on  his  shoulder  the 

long-barreled  rifle 
Ready  to  shoot  the  fleet  deer  by  the  way  or  the 

crested  wild  turkey, 
Loving  the  sport  of  the  hunter  and  furnishing 

meat  for  his  journey. 
Others  came  riding  on  horseback  well-steeded 

and  booted  and  stirruped, 
Men  of  cavalier  names  and  manners  gemming 

the  backwoods ; 
One    legislator    still    rattled  his    buckskin 

breeches  with  fringes; 
Still  another  would  strut  in  his  grandfather's 

old  regimentals. 


Whose  is  that  round  and  rubicund  face  all 

smiling  unbristled? 
Lincoln  looks  at  it  well  as  if  watching  the 

time  in  a  mirror, 
Which  is  imaging  to  him  his  opposite,  outer 

and  inner ; 
That  is  Douglas,  hardly  of  age,  and  not  long 

in  the  North- West, 
Son  of  distant  Yankeeland,  here  quite  alone 

in  his  birthdom. 
Both  of  them  heirs  of  the  future  now  casting 

the  lots  for  their  inning. 


172   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  VIII. 

Such  are  the  antitypes  twain  yet  inseparate, 

yoked  both  together, 
Suns  revolving  about  each  other  within  the 

one  system, 
Each  repellent  of  each,  yet  both  held  fast  by 

attraction 
Stronger  than  they  were  or  knew  of — that 

universal  attraction 
Which  unites  the  great  cosmos  without  us 

and  also  within  us — 
Each  fulfilling  the  other  when  seen  in  the 

cycle  of  ages. 


Soon  the  session  began  and  Lincoln  listlessly 
listened, 

For  his  heart  he  had  left  behind  in  a  home  of 
New  Salem, 

Little  remained  him  for  making  the  law  in 
Vandalia  law-making, 

"While  on  his  winter  of  soul  lay  chilly  the  win- 
ter of  nature. 

But  with  the  roll  of  the  season  the  hour  ar- 
rived for  his  speaking, 

Somehow  often  deferred  until  the  last  day  of 
the  session, 

When  he  began  to  run  through  the  State  his 
ubiquitous  railroad. 

Chiefly  his  theme  was  the  iron-bound  bond  of 
the  Union  now  rifting; 


7ANDALIA. 


Newly  remarried,  the  North  and  the  South 

would  stay  one  forever. 
Two  were  the  loves  which  seemed  interwound 

in  the  turn  of  each  sentence, 
For  the  love  of  his  country  would  fuse  with 

the  love  of  his  maiden. 
At  his  highest  he  painted  the  North  and  the 

South  in  a  picture 
Kissing,  yea  hugging  each  other  by  means  of 

his  amorous  railroad, 
Till  he  dwelt  more  on  the  union  of  love  than 

on  love  of  the  union. 
All  his  images  glowed  with  the  fire  of  a  pas- 

sionate longing 
Lit  in  two  souls    now   parted   but   living  a 

dream-life  together; 
All  his  fancies  seemed  to  burst  up  from  a 

flame  underlying, 
Even  cold  facts  were  heated  white-hot  in  the 

forge  of  his  feelings. 


Self-forgetful  he  was,  he  soon  forgot  his  dear 

railroad, 
Also  out  of  his  memory  lapsed  for  a  moment 

his  country, 
Just    the    one    fierce    love    had    seemingly 

swallowed  the  other, 
As  he  spoke  of  a  scene,  forecasting  the  place 

and  the  action ; 


174    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  R&TLEDGE.—BOOK  VIII. 

Thus  at  his  argument's  topmost  pitch  in  his 
fervor  he  cried  out : 

"Here  at  the  mulberry  tree  now  let  us  be 
plighted  forever." 

Lincoln  had  heard  his  own  words,  which 
startled  him  dumb  at  their  meaning, 

For  they  had  secretly  tapped  the  underworld 
dread  of  his  being, 

So  that  the  hope  most  hid  in  his  heart  had 
bubbled  up  sunward. 

Meanwhile  arose  with  a  shout  from  the  mem- 
bers unanimous  laughter: 

"Where  is  that  tree — we  wish  to  be  there  at 
the  tick  of  the  moment." 

But  instead  of  the  speaker  who  hushed,  an- 
other responded : 

'  *  Who  is  the  girl  f — Now  tell  us  the  story,  and 
we'll  vote  for  your  measure, 

That  I  am  sure  will  be  the  best  argument  yet 
for  your  railroad." 

Snappishly  old  Sam  Wildfly,  sarcastic  re- 
torter  from  Wabash 

Eose  to  a  point  of  order  adjusting  his  spec- 
tacles brass-rimmed : 

"Not  before  this  House  is  the  subject  brought 
up  by  the  speaker, 

From  the  railroad  wandering  off  to  the  kiss 
of  his  sweetheart ; 

'Tis  not  debatable  under  the  rules  of  Jeffer- 
son's Manual." 


VANDALIA.  175 

Such  was  the  humorous  punch  which  raised 
up  the  head-drooping  Lincoln, 

And  which  started  his  tongue  word-smit,  to 
funning  an  answer: 

' 'Friends,  the  gavel  I  seize  and  rule  myself 
out  of  order, 

For  our  departure  the  hour  has  struck — I  ad- 
journ myself  to  next  session — 

When  I  shall  finish  my  speech,  and  tell  you 
the  end  of  my  story." 


took 


The  Letters. 

Drearier  lounge  the  wintering  days  on  the 

hill  of  New  Salem, 
Older  the  hours  have  seemed  to  be  growing 

since  Lincoln's  departure, 
And  the  village  though  young  in  its  years 

turns  gray  with  the  season, 
Aged  already  within  while  silvered  in  snow 

of  December. 
Hark!  the  hoarse  crows  which  are  dolefully 

cawing  around  the  bleak  skyline! 
Almost  bare  are  the  boughs  of  the  sycamore 

hung  with  its  plume-balls, 
Which  keep  swinging  in  dance  to  the  bois- 
terous tune  of  the  storm-wind, 
Till  they  are  whirled  from  their  sport  and 

drop  to  the  earth  in  the  springtime. 
(176) 


THE  LETTERS.  ^77 

Icy  and  shrunk  the  rivulet  crawls  through 

Sangamon  Valley, 
Listlessly  laving  old  logs  that  are  lodged  in 

the  slime  of  its  streambed, 
While  the  sere  grass  on  its  banks  droops 

over  to  house  the  shy  rabbit. 


People  at  home  would  hug  the  hot  hearth  in 

moody  seclusion, 
Or  at  the  store  would  cock  up  their  feet  on 

the  stove  in  a  circle, 
Bating  the  times  for  their  troubles,  not  spar- 

ing the  lag  of  the  village, 
Often  shying  a  rock  at  the  law  and  the  lax 

legislation. 
Every  minute  ticked  off  a  complaint  and 

blamed  every  other, 
And  all  daylight  from  morning  till  evening 

seemed  only  sunset, 
Even  old  Time  lagged  weary  of  scything  the 

universe  wicked. 


But  the  stream  of  discussion  would  lash  into 

foam  at  the  highest 
When  two  speakers  would  clinch  and  begin 

a  political  wrestle, 
Deftly  unsheathing  their  keen-edged  tongues 

for  a  stab  or  a  story. 


178     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  7.T. 

Best  of  these  fencers  were  Squire  Ebenezer 

and  Doctor  Palmetto 
When  they  both  waxed  wroth  on  the  theme 

of  President  Jackson 
Till  the  wordsmen  seemed  ready  to  turn  on 

the  spot  into  swordsmen. 
Still  they  did  not,  for  after  one  sally  of  hot 

effervescence, 
Evenly  Squire  Ebenezer  would  balance  the 

scales  of  his  temper, 
Cooling  down  from  his  boil  to  big  bubbles 

of  good-natured  humor. 


Lincoln  had  failed  not  to  send  a  letter  each 

week  from  Vandalia, 
Where  he  was  passing  the  winter  in  exile 

unhappy  yet  hopeful- 
Letter  well-spelt,  well-written  of  hand,  well- 
turned  in  its  phrases, 
Over  each  word  of  his  pen  he  would  linger  a 

moment  in  longing, 
For  he  well  knew  who  would  hear  it  and 

feel  out  its  meaning  most  deeply, 
Though  it  be  sent  to  the  name  of  the  Lady 

Eulalia  Lovelace 
Who  would  open  it  first  and  peruse  all  the 

words  in  it  written, 
Words  on  the  surface  subdued  to  the  calm 

of  an  inner  renouncement. 


THE  LETTERS.  179 

Still  he  would  utter  the  wish  of  his  heart 
to  get  back  to  New  Salem, 

Giving  various  reasons,  all  good,  but  never 
the  best  one, 

Which  he  would  cunningly  hide  between  lines 
as  they  flowed  in  his  missive. 

Often  the  word  had  one  sense  for  the  Lady 
and  one  for  the  maiden; 

But  at  times  broke  forth  in  despite  the  gen- 
uine outburst; 

"Tell  me,"  he  asks  in  a  letter,  "which  of 
them  is  the  more  binding 

Be  it  Love's  troth  or  Love's  truth,  or  be  it 
the  form  or  the  essence?" 

Then  again  he  would  lip  a  few  sounds  of  the 
strife  of  his  bosom: 

"Lawmaker  sworn  of  the  State  I  am  seem- 
ing my  days  at  Vandalia, 

Lawbreaker  down  in  my  heart  I  oft  catch 
me  in  plans  of  my  action." 


Such  were  the  sayings  which  he  would  weave 
in  the  ink  of  his  pen-lines 

Scarce  understood  by  the  reader,  the  Lady 
Eulalia  Lovelace; 

But  spring-clear  to  Ann  Rutledge  who  silent- 
ly saw  to  their  bottom, 

For  they  told  her  own  to  herself,  reflecting 
her  image, 


180     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUT  LEDGE. —BOOK  IX. 

Thus  confessing  himself  he  spoke  her  deep- 
est confession. 

Lastly  he  utters  the  man  in  the  words  of  a 
balanced  decision: 

''Though  unpledged,  I  shall  ever  be  faithful 
— not  faithless  with  pledges ; 

Loyal  still,  though  renouncing  loyalty's  fair- 
est fruition." 

Eeading  this  passage  one  day,  the  Lady 
rose  asking  the  question : 

"What  does  it  mean?  Do  you  know?"  but 
the  maiden  held  sighless  her  breath-tip, 

Leaving  unworded  the  throbs  in  her  bosom 
assailing  each  other, 

Till  she  went  home  to  herself  and  lulled  them 
in  tasks  of  the  household. 


Nun-like  in  look  she  eases  her  heart  of  its 

struggle  by  labor, 
Even  the  loom  she  plies  not  so  much  through 

need  of  the  fabric 
As  for  the  sake  of  its  soul-tuning  gift  of 

sweet  reminiscence 
Softly  retelling  her  thoughts  as  she  wove 

the  garment  of  Lincoln, 
And  recalling  the  bliss  which  arose  with  the 

play  of  the  shuttle, 
When  he  appeared  at  the  window  just  in  the 

midst  of  her  dream-world. 


THE  LETTERS. 


Nor  forgot  she  the  flutter  of  doom  in  the  fall 

of  the  letter 
"Which  still  next  to  her  heart  she  wore  with 

its  symbol  of  crimson. 
So  in  her  feeling  would  rise  the  combat  ever- 

recurrent, 
Raging  between  sweet  Love  in  itself  and  stern 

Love  as  a  duty. 
Often  she  looked  at  her  image  within  as  a 

person  divided  — 
Self  unleal  has  given  away  the  Self  that  is 

leal; 
What  is  her  fate  where  her  heart  and  her 

hand  are  fighting  each  other? 


In  the  stress  of  her  spirit  she  draws  from  her 

bosom  its  treasure, 
And  has  started  to  grope  for  the  secret  sense 

of  the  message, 
Long  she  stares  in  a  far-away  trance  at  the 

blood-tinted  symbol, 
Even  she  picks  up  her  pen  to  send  a  request 

to  Vandalia, 
When  a  fresh  letter  is  brought  and  laid  on 

the  table  before  her 
Just  alongside  of  the  red-hearted  missive  of 

Lincoln  it  fell  down. 

Strangely  withheld  she  her  hand  from  put- 
ting a  word  on  the  paper. 


182     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUT  LEDGE. —BOOK  IX. 

Well  she  knew  the  turn  of  the  script  and  the 

sort  of  envelope, 
Knew  who  had  written  her  name  on  its  back, 

and  the  penmanship's  flourish; 
Oft  she  had  seen  it  before  in  times  gone  by 

though  not  lately. 
Blow  unexpected!  though  long  expected!  the 

letter  has  come  now ! 
Letter   of   absentee   Abner   announcing  his 

speedy  arrival, 
Wreathing  skillfully  many  excuses  for  ab- , 

sence  and  silence. 

But  he  soon  will  return  to  make  good  by  mar- 
riage his  promise, 
And  a  festival  hold  for  herself  and  for  all  of 

New  Salem. 


Stronger  than  ever  she  felt  the  daggered 
strife  in  her  bosom 

Cutting  both  ways  till  divided  she  swooned 
in  her  chair  for  a  moment; 

Then  she  rallied  and  rose  to  her  feet  in  the 
strength  of  her  passion 

While  the  two  letters  she  seized  as  if  grap- 
pling the  source  of  her  conflict; 

With  teeth  clenched  she  flung  both  of  them 
down  on  the  table  together, 

Where  they  stood  on  their  edges  and  leaned 
each  to  each  in  a  combat, 


THE  LETTERS.  183 

Till  they  slowly  fell  over,  the  heart-blazoned 
one  on  top  of  the  other, 

Hiding  quite  the  address  though  wreathed  in 
fanciful  pen-strokes. 

Ann  had  tokened  with  bodeful  delight  the 
prognostication, 

Though  in   triumph   she  suddenly  glowed, 

she  drooped  soon  defeated, 
.And  began  to  wrench  in  the  struggle  more 
deeply  than  ever 

Which  now  stood  in  her  eye-glance,  while 
also  it  raged  in  her  bosom. 

Thus  to  herself  she  dialogued  there  her  fu- 
rious  soul-strife: 

"Sacred  promise  on  one  side,  sacred  love 
on  the  other, 

I  between  them  am  lodged,  yea  within  them, 
and  they  too  within  me 

Where  they  rend  me  in  twain  while  ruth- 
lessly rending  each  other. 

Not  alone  do  I  view,  but  I  am,  their  desper- 
ate duel." 


From  the  table  she  picked  up  the  letters  and 

held  in  each  hand  one : 
In  the  left  she  caressingly  stroked  with  her 

fingers  the  heart's  sign, 
In  the  right  she  crumpled  her  name  writ  on 

the  envelope 


184     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  IX. 

Crushing  all  of  its  well-rounded  flourishes 

into  cross  wrinkles  and  creases 
And  at  the  top  of  her  frenzy  she  called  to 

the  fighters  inside  her: 
" Which  is  it?     Shall  now  perish  my  heart 

or  perish  my  pledges'? 
Is  Love  ruler  of  Law,  or  is  it  the  Law  which 

is  ruler?" 
Both  of  the  letters  fell  down  on  the  table 

from  fingers  unnerving, 
Then  with  a  sigh  she  smoothed  out  the  folds 

of  the  script  she  had  crumpled, 
And  re-read  her  own  name  on  the  back  of 

the  furrowed  envelope. 
Soon  the  letters  she  picked  up  and  held  both 

together  thus  saying: 
"Oh  this  strife  I  cannot  endure,  nor  can  I 

resolve  it, 
On  these  covers  of  paper  are  wrestling  the 

very  inscriptions, 
Eed  against  dark,  the  heart  against  words 

of  my  name  writ  in  order 
Outwardly  trimmed  with  many  a  curled-up 

crinkle  and  frizzle. 
Off  again  I  must  haste  to  the  rare  reconciler 

of  trouble." 


Quickly  she  reaches  the  mansion  of  Lady  Eu- 
lalia  Lovelace 


LETTERS. 


Who  so  often  had  stayed  the  tossed  soul  in 

sympathy  hopeful, 
On  whose  palm  are  laid  the  two  letters  with 

problems  embattled, 
When  she  responded  what  seemed  to  accord 

with  the  wish  of  the  asker  : 
"Absentee   lovers   must   forfeit   the   claim 

which  they  have  neglected; 
And  the  promise,  if  not  fulfilled  in  its  time, 

is  unpromised. 
Thou  hast  waited  the  limit,  renouncing  thy 

tenderest  selfhood; 
Thy  new  freedom  of  choice  thou  hast  won, 

just  by  thy  renouncement." 


So  the  oracle  spake,  oracular  still  her  re- 
sponses ; 
But  the  wound  lay  deeper,  far  deeper  than 

she  had  suspected. 
For  Ann  glanced  at  the  ring  and  appeared  to 

shrink  back  from  the  outlook, 
Feeling  the  might  of  her  word  once  given  to 

thrill  on  her  heart-strings. 
Then  the  Lady  Eulalia  uttered  boldly  the 

mandate : 
"Take  off  that  sign  of  betrothal  which  now 

encircles  thy  finger, 
Let  me  have  it  to  give  to  the  right  one  whom 

I  shall  discover, 


186     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.— BOOK  IX.  } 

Or  to  return  to  the  owner  when  thine  ndj 

longer  it  can  be." 
Tearfully  tense  Ann  Eutledge  replied  to  the 

words  of  the  Lady, 
"That  I  have  often  attempted  already,  but 

never  it  slips  off, 
Hand  may  wrestle  with  hand,  but  the  one 

cannot  conquer  the  other; 
Then  if  it  come  off,  that  is  no  stop  of  the 

struggle  within  me, 
Firmer  this  ring  has  been  put  on  my  soul 

than  here  on  my  finger. " 


Up  from  her  seat  the  maiden  had  sprung  in 
the  thrust  of  her  sentence, 

When  old  Betsey  the  negress  appeared  and 
brought  in  a  letter, 

Aye  a  new  letter  making  the  third  of  that 
company  written, 

Which  had  just  come  by  the  mail  addressed 
to  the  mansion's  mistress, 

In  a  hand-writing  well  known  to  the  watch- 
ful eye  of  Ann  Eutledge, 

Who  had  caught  at  a  glance  the  dip  of  the 
lines  on  the  missive. 

Soon  the  Lady  had  broken  the  seal  and  read 
the  short  message, 

Which  she  reported :  "Lincoln  is  now  on  his 
way  to  New  Salem, 


THE  LETTERS. 


More  than  a  week  is  gone  since  the  session 

adjourned  at  Yandalia; 
He  is  making  a  roundabout  journey  to  visit 

his  parents, 
Chiefly  his  step-mother;  who  in  his  boyhood 

mothered  his  soul's  hope. 
Let  me  count  up  the  time  —  he  may  come 

down  the  road  any  minute." 


Ann  sank  back  to  her  seat  at  the  word  medi- 
tatively silent, 

For  there  began  in  the  depths  of  her  heart 
a  new  kind  of  encounter: 

As  she  thought  the  two  lovers  might  meet  in 
that  mansion  together. 

Abner  was  coming,  Lincoln  was  coming,  per- 
chance the  next  minute ; 

Both  had  announced  by  letter  the  news  of 
their  future  intention. 

Soon  she  upgathered  herself  and  nervously 
clutched  her  two  letters, 

One  hand  took  hold  of  the  heart-sign,  the 
other  was  twirling  the  word-sign 

With  the  tips  of  her  fingers,  as  she  bemoaned 
her  contention: 

''Higher,  still  higher  is  rising  the  struggle 
within  and  without  me ! 

Where  can  I  turn  now  for  help,  or  even  a 
hope  of  allayment — 


188     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  IX. 

Not  to  the  world  which  flings  me  from  all 
to  the  den  of  my  demons, 

Not  to  myself,  who  am  but  the  battle  ground 
for  my  own  feelings 

Which  to  the  death  have  grappled  to  throt- 
tle each  other  and  me  too." 


Lady  Eulalia  looked  at  the  speaker1  with 
sympathy  hopeless, 

Quite  tongue-tied  in  her  doubt  as  to  what 
she  could  do  in  the  crisis, 

For  the  case  lay  beyond  all  her  power  of 
sage  ministration. 

It  was  the  first  time  she  ever  had  known  the 
defeat  of  her  wisdom, 

And  she  could  not  help  thinking  her  hour  had 
struck  for  departure 

Back  to  the  home  of  her  earliest  love  in  her 
vaunted  Virginia. 

Also  Ann  Eutledge  had  felt  the  fresh  impo- 
tence of  her  adviser, 

As  she  uttered  in  sighs  her  word  of  re- 
newed resignation: 

"This  is  a  criss-cross  far  stronger  than  I 
am,  even  than  we  are ; 

Mightier  is  the  high  hand  which  is  dealing 
this  dole  to  my  life's  course. 

When  I  came  hither  I  bore  in  my  soul  two 
sides  of  a  combat, 


THE  LETTERS.  139 

And  I  bore  in  my  hand  two  strifes  in  the 

inkstains  of  writing ; 
Both  of  thd  messages  warring  flew  down 

from  above  on  my  table, 
For  a  spell  I  gazed  at  their  conflict,  e'en 

tried  to  compose  it, 
But  it  had  gone  already  beyond  my  power 

of  self-help — 
That  fierce  duel  between  the  two  scripts  of 

Abner  and  Lincoln. 
So  I  ran  out  of  the  house  and  hastened  my 

pace  to  your  mansion, 
Seeking  my  peace  from  the  sweet  benediction 

which  flows  from  your  presence." 


Brightlier  gleamed  in  her  eyes  the  Lady  Eu- 

lalia  Lovelace 
When  she  glimpsed  but  a  glance  of  herself 

in  solacing  sorrow, 
For  she  would  live  the  beatitude  born  of  the 

peace-maker  blessed. 
But  the  maiden  then  paled  and  gave  a  new 

turn  to  her  problem : 
' '  Only  behold  this  wheel  of  my  destiny  whirl 

a  fresh  struggle! 

Not  the  two  letters  alone  engage  now  in  fu- 
rious combat, 
Eising  up  like  contestants  before  the  thick 

throngs  of  my  fancy 


190     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RVTLEDOE.—BOOK  IX. 

And  then  clinching,  line  around  line,  for 

the  deadly  encounter, 
But  the  two  writers  themselves  appear  in 

personal  presence; 
Strangely  transmuted  to  life  from  the  ink 

of  their  very  hand-writing, 
Forth  they  step  in  array  from  behind  the 

dark  strokes  of  their  pen-points 
Into  the  place  of  their  meeting  which  is  my 

soul  as  the  witness, 

Yea  as  the  battle  itself  too,  and  I  am  the  vic- 
tor and  vanquished: 
God!  perchance  in  this  duel  I  am  the  slain 

and  the  slayer," 


In  a  surge  of  foreboding  she  quitted  the 
house  of  her  helper, 

Who  no  longer  could  help  in  the  deluge  of 
down-pouring  trials, 

Feeling  the  world  to  be  fated  around  her 
and  changed  to  a  demon 

That  was  dogging  her  soul  with  remorse  ful- 
filling a  judgment 

Which  had  been  burnt  in  her  brain  by  the 
tongue-flame  of  Cartright  the  preacher. 

Even  the  sunshine  shone  doom  on  the  man- 
sion, the  schoolhouse,  the  village, 

As  she  looked  back  on  her  path,  or  forward 
away  in  the  landscape. 


THE  LETTERS. 


But  the  letters  she  kept,  for  she  could  not 

part  from  their  presence, 
Just  one  glance  at  them  both  would  give 

some  relief  to  her  soul's  fray, 
As  it  turned  her  from  Furies  inside  to  the 

symbols  outside  her. 
Still  the  one  letter  she  bore  in  her  bosom 

where  it  lay  hidden, 
While  the  other  she  twisted  in  twirls  of  her 

fugitive  fingers  ; 
So  the  heart  and  the  hand  kept  asunder  in 

space  and  in  spirit. 


Lonely  and  lorn  she  wandered  about  the 
streets  of  the  village 

To  herself  unknown  in  what  she  was  dream- 
ily doing, 

Till  at  last  she  had  come  to  the  mulberry 
tree  and  its  settle, 

Drawn  to  memory 's  shrine  by  the  instinct  of 
happier  moments. 

But  on  her  joy  soon  smote  the  dread  back- 
stroke of  sorrow  remorseful 

Till  she  dragged  from  her  bosom  to  view  the 
red-symboled  letter, 

Tearing  it  nearly  atwain  through  the  heart 
that  reddened  upon  it, 

When  she  besaw  it  a  moment  as  by  a  shred  it 
was  hanging; 


192     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOE  IX. 

Then  with  a  seeming  relief  which  bespoke 

it  dearer  than  ever, 
Gently  she  put  it  again  in  its  place  just 

next  to  her  heart-throbs. 


Spring,   the  young   lover,   was   kissing   in 

warmth  the  hill  and  the  valley, 
Trees  had  responded  with  outburst  of  buds 

and  of  leaves  and  of  flowers 
While  the  prairie  had  flung  out  in  rapture 

its  flowing  green  garment, 
In  whose  folds  it  now  draped  its  bare  white 

body  of  winter. 
Also  the  mulberry's  branches  had  answered 

the  vernal  caresses, 
Eobed  in  foliage  new  which  bended  down 

over  the  settle, 
To  embrace  it  in  love  and  to  hide  it  from 

prying  outsiders, 

Waving  above  it  the  treetop's  coronal  stud- 
ded with  flowers, 
One  of  which  hung  close  down  to  the  hand 

of  Ann  Eutledge  who  plucked  it, 
As  she  drew  from  her  bosom  the  letter  and 

gazed  at  the  red-heart, 
Which  in  spite  of  the  rent  kept  clinging  in 

hope  still  together. 
But  the  other  envelope  was  whisked  to  the 

earth  in  her  motion, 


THE  LETTERS, 


"Whose  inscription  she  saw,  when  she  heard 

its  command  to  be  picked  up. 
Meantime  she  thought  of  the  man  who  had 

woven  this  intricate  settle 
Out  of  the  tortuous  twigs  of  the  tree  and 

the  sinewy  grapevines 
For  a  purpose  she  knew  of  indeed,  as  she 

often  had  used  it  — 
Aye,  was  using  it  now  in  the  fanciful  work 

of  her  day-dreams. 
Still  she  foreboded  that  to  it  remained  some 

higher  fulfilment, 
As  the  trysting-place  final  of  love  for  him 

and  for  her  too. 


Why  in  her  face  are  the  flashes  now  fitfully 
chasing  each  other! 

Ah,  she  is  glancing  again  at  the  ring  ingrown 
on  her  finger, 

Circling  also  her  soul,  the  fatal  ring  of  be- 
trothal, 

Which  rounds  fiercely  in  one  ear  the  promise 
with  hiss  of  a  demon, 

But  in  the  other  breathes  softly  the  unpronv 
ised  love,  like  an  angel ; 

Even  by  one  wrench  more  she  tests  it,  but 
vain  is  the  effort. 


194     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  IX. 

Then  she  holds  up  before  her  and  ponders 
that  heart  of  renouncement 

Which  sheds  comfort  anew  with  a  hope  of 
some  happy  deliverance, 

Though  it  hangs  on  a  shred,  by  a  Fury  cleft 
through  in  the  middle. 

Out  of  her  revery  lofty  she  woke  at  the  call 
of  the  bluebird 

Which  on  a  twig  just  over  her  head  is  swing- 
ing and  singing 

Merrily  for  its  winged  mate  who  flies  to  its 
home  in  the  branches, 

Where  are  performed  to  the  music  of  breezes 
the  happy  espousals 

Which  she  looks  up  at  in  joy,  then  she  beams 
her  lit  eye-glances  earthward. 


Down  the  road  in  the  distance  she  sees  a  tall 
figure  approaching; 

Well  she  remembered  the  words  of  Lady  Eu- 
lalia  Lovelace 

While  perusing  a  letter  in  forecast  of  some- 
body coming ; 

Still  that  shape  appeared  to  be  strolling  up 
out  of  her  dream-world 

Limned  into  life  there  before  her  largening 
eyes:  who  is  it? 


Back  from  Capital. 

"Swim,  if  you  dare,  in  a  race  with  me  over 

this  turbulent  river, 
To  yon  hill-top  of  green,  the  highest  above 

the  mad  surges." 


Lincoln  shot  out  the  words  at  a  rounded  and 

orotund  talker, 
Douglas,  whom  he  would  test  by  a  dare  to  a 

trial  of  action, 
Who  stood  merrily  babbling,  the  center  of 

home-going  members, 
Young,  but  already  well-versed  in  the  art  of 

winning  men's  friendship, 
Skillful  to  draw  the  attention,  and  clever  in 

cunning  devices. 

(195) 


196     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X 

"Pick  up  your  gauntlet  at  once  I  shall,  and 

now  I  am  ready." 
Then  he  began  on  the  spot  before  all  to  strip 

for  the  struggle, 
Seizing  the  start  to  tickle  the  lungs  of  the 

pioneer  hardy, 
Who  delighted  to  cheer  on  the  contest  and 

watch  the  contestants. 


Such  was  the  trial  of  strength,  the  first  one 
of  many  to  follow, 

Testing  the  Age's  advancing  protagonists, 
Lincoln  and  Douglas, 

Who  had  already  selected  each  other,  uncon- 
sciously choosing. 

Each  of  them  faced  to  the  opposite  side  in 
political  measures, 

Counterparts  seemed  they  in  stature  and 
spirit,  yet  bound  up  together. 

Often  they  met  and  passed  with  a  nod  in  the 
course  of  the  session, 

But  underneath  ever  feeling  the  grapple  of 
destinies  inner, 

Which  now  utterance  found,  ere  they  part- 
ed, in  shape  of  a  challenge, 

Friendly  indeed,  yet  presaging  perchance  the 
cast  of  the  future. 

Strange,  but  the  eyeshot  of  each  would 
pierce  to  the  soul  of  the  other, 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  197 

Though  not  a  word  in  jest  or  in  earnest  be 
spoken  by  either. 

Lincoln,  when  he  had  come  to  his  fireside, 
thus  often  reflected: 

'  *  Truly,  of  all  of  the  men  I  have  seen  in  the 
test  of  this  session, 

That  young  fellow  belongs  to  the  future, 
tried  by  my  touch-stone. 

So  do  I  also — both  of  us,  twinned  to  a  mutual 
struggle — 

Spirit  wrestles  with  spirit  in  a  spectral  mul- 
titude's presence; 

I  can  feel  this  genius  of  mine  in  a  coil  with 
his  genius, 

If  I  but  pass  him  alone  on  the  street,  each 
silently  stepping. 

So  I  shall  test  futurity's  wink  by  this  inno- 
cent wager, 

Whether  perchance  the  oracle  dark  may  hint 
me  a  presage." 


Both  of  them  daringly  plunged  in  the  surges 

of  swollen  Kaskaskia, 
Far   overflowing  its  banks  by  the  copious 

showers  of  springtime, 
Whirling  along  in  its  wrath  much  soil,  some 

trees  and  a  cabin, 
Animals  wild  and  tame  could  be  seen  in  a 

strife  with  the  torrent ; 


198     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X. 

Once  a  corpse  came  bobbing  along  in  the  roll 

of  the  wavelets, 
Ghastly   warning   to    youths    ambitious    of 

swimming  the  deluge. 


Douglas  scudded  more  quickly  the  scum  of 

the  boiling  Kaskaskia, 
Splashing  his  strokes  in  the  stream  till  he 

reached  a  helpful  green  islet, 
Where  overworn  by  the  task  he  lay  down  on 

the  bed  of  its  herbage. 
Lincoln  more  slowly  kept  whirling  long  arms 

in  circles  successive, 
Till  he  passed  the  green  islet  without  ever 

stopping  to  rest  there, 
And  was  nearing  the  goal  when  Douglas 

again  wooed  the  waters. 
But  too  late — the  stout  swimmer  could  be 

overtaken  no  longer, 
Who   soon  strode  up  the  hill  the  highest 

above  the  wild  current. 


Generous  Douglas  was  first  to  salute  his  ri- 
val as  victor, 

While  the  crowd  on  the  shore  responded  with 
cheers  to  the  triumph; 

And  then  rapidly  homeward  scattered  to  put 
in  their  corn-crops, 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  199 

Not  to  meet  till  next  winter  again  in  law- 
making  Vandalia— 

Dozens  of  Spartan  Lycurguses  sprung  of  the 
Western  prairie. 


Now  behold  on  the  road  from  the  Capital, 
Abraham  Lincoln 

By  a  roundabout  route  returning  in  hope  to 
New  Salem, 

Out  of  the  tumult  concentered  from  all  of 
the  State  to  a  whirlpool, 

Out  of  the  conflict  of  soul  which  raged  with- 
in him  by  absence. 

Glad  he  is  to  be  free  of  the  struggle  of  par- 
ties for  power, 

Glad  to  be  rid  for  a  while  of  the  troubles  that 
loomed  in  the  Nation. 


Still  he  bears  deep  strife,  the  deepest  of  all 

in  his  life-time : 
He  the  maker  of  Law,  doth  feel  himself  too 

its  unmaker, 
As  he  appeals  the  keen  suit  of  his  Love  to 

his  own  Legislature. 
Thus  of  two  Law-giving  bodies  strangely  he 

finds  himself  member, 
Issuing  opposite  mandates,  both  valid,  an 

outer  and  inner. 


200     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOE  X. 

Lover  and  lawgiver  coupled  lie  is,  each  fight- 
ing the  other, 

Making  the  law  and  breaking  the  law  he  joins 
in  one  person. 

So  he  quits  the  mad  scene,  at  odds  with  him- 
self and  the  place  too, 

Often  preluding  alone  on  his  path  this  note 
of  his  discord: 

"Strifeful  State-House,  next  time  I  shall 
carry  thee  off  elsewhither, 

Even  shall  bear  thee  away  to  my  home  in  the 
Sangamon  Valley. " 


So  he  already  had  spoken  his  mind  to  Van- 
dalia's  dwellers 

"Whose  one  creed  was  antipathy  to  all  Capi- 
tal-movers— 

They  who  would  steal  the  beautiful  bride  of 
Kaskaskia's  kisses, 

Making  her  marry  that  dwarf  of  a  Sangamon 
shrunken, 

Which  was  scarcely  able  to  float  a  respect- 
able flat-boat, 

While  their  own  dear  nymph  of  a  stream 
seemed  an  Amazon  mighty. 


Still  the  lore  which  Lincoln  had  won  was 
learnt  for  a  life-time, 


SACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  £01 

Every  part  of  the  State  he  had  seen  in  its 

men  at  Vandalia, 
Leaders  selected  they  were  from  its  South, 

and  its  North,  and  its  Middle, 
Well  representing  the  flood  of  its  people  now 

forward  now  backward, 
Hinting  iflie  interflow  subtle  of  currents  of 

western  migration, 
As  they  came  rolling  along  from  the  old 

Thirteen  to  the  New-State, 
Knitting  together  and  knotting  in  thousands 

of  communal  nodules 
At  the  crossing  of  roads,  or  perchance  at  the 

ferry  of  rivers, 
Eound  the  new  sawmill  or  gristmill  driven  by 

fall  of  the  water, 
Eound  the  strong  man  as  center,  whose  soul 

was  the  soul  of  the  village. 


Heroes  big  and  little  were  these,  heroic 

world-builders, 
Prairial    demi-gods,    Hercules    modernized, 

but  yet  unstoried, 
Draining    the    swamps,    and    slaying    wild 

beasts,  and  subduing  wild  Nature, 
So  they  laid  everywhere  the  foundations  of 

civilized  order. 


202     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X. 

Such  were  the  men  whose  choicest  by  Lin- 
coln were  seen  at  Vandalia, 

Now  the  lawgivers  chosen  for  the  whole 
State  by  their  people. 

Often  he  heard  them  discussing  together  the 
overcast  problem: 

Which  is  first  in  authority's  right:  the  State 
or  the  Nation, 

Some  upholding  the  one  as  supreme,  but 
others  the  other. 

Often  he  thought :  * '  Just  that  is  the  question 
which  has  to  be  settled 

In  the  future — not  by  the  word,  but  the 
deed — oh!  Heaven!" 


Well  he  recalled  the  same  problem  debated 
by  two  young  Lieutenants 

In  the  Black  Hawk  War,  officers  both  of  the 
National  Army, 

Eobert  Anderson  one  of  them,  Jefferson  Da- 
vis the  other; 

Each  stood  ready  to  battle  on  opposite  sides 
of  the  conflict. 

That  debate  had  stayed  in  his  mind  with  des- 
tiny's imprint, 

For  the  strife  had  seemed  to  take  place  with- 
in him  on  both  sides, 

Yet  at  the  end  the  vision  rose  up  of  himself 
as  the  healer. 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  203 

So  the  political  drift  underlying  the  rush  of 

the  session 
Often  transmuted  its  sound  in  his  soul  to  a 

music  uncanny 
Like  the  clashing  of  steel  and  once  like  the 

roar  of  a  cannon, 
Dark  presentiment's  underflow  bursting  its 

way  up  to  sunlight. 


Thug  was  trudging  along  the  new  road  the 
lawmaker  Lincoln, 

Leisurely  tuning  his  steps  to  the  gait  of  his 
slow  meditations, 

Which  came  echoing  back  to  him  out  of  Van- 
dalia's  winter 

With  its  manifold  conflicts  in  Memory's  bil- 
lows resurging, 

As  they  rolled  quivering  through  him  in 
shapes  of  his  feverish  fancy, 

Images  loving  of  Love,  and  of  State,  and 
also  of  Nation, 

While  around  them  would  rise  unbidden  the 
presence  of  Douglas, 

Now  his  counterpart  fated  to  march  with 
him  forth  to  the  future, 

Like  a  high  pair  of  cosmical  suns  in  hot  revo- 
lution, 

Till  all  ablaze  in  its  death  the  one  drops  into 
the  other. 


204     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X. 

Suddenly  near  the  roadside  he  heard  the 
strokes  of  a  chopper 

Who  was  felling  in  thirls  of  his  axe  the  oak 
of  the  forest. 

Bit  by  bit  he  had  cut  the  bole  of  the  tree  to 
its  center 

On  one  side,  and  had  wearily  started  to  chip 
at  the  other, 

When  the  tall  stranger  steps  up  to  him  beg- 
ging a  turn  at  the  axe-helve. 

To  the  proposal  the  woodman  consented, 
deep-breathing  his  "Yes,  sir." 


Lincoln  then  started  his  labor,  whicH  was 

a  flight  from  his  feelings; 
Out  of  his  inner  world  suddenly  seemed  he 

to  speed  to  his  outer, 
Work  had  called  him  away  from  himself  in 

the  clash  of  his  conflict, 
Given  him  happy  release   by  turning  his 

thought  into  action; 
Walking  up  to  the  tree,  he  had  walked  from 

one  life  to  another. 


Deftly  he  clenched  his  keen  weapon  and 
whirled  it  around  in  great  circles, 

Cutting  a  mouth  in  the  oak  which  spat  out 
its  chips  all  about  him, 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  205 

Till  its  heart  had  been  slit,  and  its  head 

many-branched  began   drooping, 
When  it  started  to  crash  in  its  fall  through 

the  neighboring  tree-tops, 
Bending  the  limbs  in  its  path  as  it  fell  to 

the  earth  like  a  giant 
Shaking  the  forest  around  and  afar  with  a 

grand  detonation. 


Lincoln  then  spake  to  the  man  who  admired 
the  swirl  of  his  arm's  swing: 

''Now  you  are  breathed,  so  bring  on  your 
saw  with  its  set-teeth 

If  you  wish  me  to  help  you  cut  up  this  bole 
into  saw-logs 

Fit  to  be  sawn  into  boards  or  split  by  the 
wedge  into  fence-rails." 

Gladly  the  man  brought  thither  the  sharp- 
toothed  saw  and  two-handled, 

Soon  it  had  bitten  the  bole  into  logs  of  the 
length  of  the  fence-rail, 

Which  they  readily  rolled  apart  by  the  help 
of  the  hand-spike, 

When  kind  Lincoln  offered  once  more  the 
good  of  his  service, 

Likewise  seeking  to  drive  off  the  merciless 
gnaw  of  the  glum-glums : 


206     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X. 

"  Yonder  I  see  the  maul  and  the  wedge  for 
cleaving  this  oak-log, 

Let  me  put  them  to  work  that  I  splinter  it 
into  fine  fence-rails. 

I  am  come  from  the  Capital  where  I  was  law- 
making  member, 

But  at  home  I  now  feel,  engaged  in  this  pres- 
ent vocation; 

Happier  far  as  a  rail-splitter  than  as  a  law- 
giver am  I." 


Then  with  a  joy  on  his  face  he  knuckled  the 

hickory  handle, 
And  kept  whizzing  around  in  great  spirals 

the  oak-knotted  maul-head, 
Fetching  it  down  with  a  thud  on  the  top  of 

the  ironwood  wedges, 
Till  the  tough-grained  log  he  had  riven  to 

right-fashioned  fence-rails, 
Not  too  big  nor  too  little  for  keeping  the 

swine  from  the  cornfield. 


Ended  the  task  with  a  story,  the  woodman 

spake  up  astonished: 
* '  Stranger,  how  comes  it  that  work  you  seem 

to  regard  as  a  pastime?" 
In  slow  words  of  reflection  the  railsplitter 

mauled  him  the  answer : 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  £07 

1  'Humble  the  deed  may  be,  and  still  of  its 
kind  can  be  perfect; 

Excellence  would  I  attain  in  my  life,  though 
but  a  wee  sparkle ; 

All  perfection  is  Godlike,  it  need  be  just  a 
scintilla. 

So  it  results  that  in  making  a  rail  I  find 
greater  pleasure 

Than  in  making  a  law  when  I  know  not  how 
I  can  make  it. 

Let  me  the  excellent  be,  though  only  the  ex- 
cellent hogherd." 


Lincoln  then  nodded  a  farewell,  still  his  so- 
liloquy voicing : 

1 '  But  the  railsplitter  perfect  must  rise  to  the 
lawmaker  perfect. 

Over  my  limit  to  mount  is  the  excellence  all- 
excelling. 

That  is  the  test  which  awaits  me  next  time  at 
law-making  Vandalia." 


From  the  stare  of  the  man  the  speaker  then 
fled  through  the  brushwood, 

Leaving  his  burden  behind  as  he  skipped  out 
into  the  open; 

Light  was  the  heart  now  of  Lincoln  as  fleetly 
he  sped  on  the  roadway ; 


298     LINCOLN  AMD  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X. 

Mauling  the  bole  with  his  brawn,  he  had 
mauled  from  his  brain  all  his  troubles, 

Freed  of  the  inner  corrosion  which  sprang 
from  the  clash  of  his  conflicts. 


Now  all  at  once  he  beholds  in  himself  the  de- 
lights of  the  spring-time, 

Which  is  outwardly  rollicking  over  the  wold 
and  the  woodland, 

Tuning  the  earth  and  the  sky  to  the  mood  of 
its  laugh  universal. 

Oft  he  would  stop  and  hark  to  the  chorus 
of  thousands  of  blackbirds, 

Who  were  chanting  their  ecstacy  for  the  re- 
turn of  the  season, 

In  the  shaggy  high  sycamore  hugging  and 
shading  the  brookside, 

Out  of  whose  branches  were  pouring  the 
showers  of  melody  sky-born. 


On  the  root  of  a  tree,  where  the  rivulet 

drowsily  rippled, 
Lincoln  sat  down  by  the  wayside,  listing  the 

choir  of  the  warblers, 
Who  might  sing  him  to  sleep  in  a  roundel 

attuned  to  the  waters. 


SACK  FROM  CAPITAL  £09 

Soon  he  had  dreamed  himself  stepping  the 
road  in  sight  of  New  Salem; 

There  he  saw  too  the  mansion  of  Lady  Eu- 
lalia  Lovelace, 

Thinking  how  always  his  missives  to  her 
were  meant  for  another, 

For  the  maiden  who  treasured  the  fire-red 
sign  of  renouncement. 

Eut  he  passed  onward,  dreaming  to  hie  to 
the  heart  of  the  village, 

Where!  he  would  greet  good  "William  the 
wainwright  and  Squire  Ebenezer, 

Then   to   the   crowd   assembled  about  him 
would  tell  a  new  story. 

But  mid  his  revery  rustled  the  branches 
above  him  in  whispers, 

So  that  he  trod  in  his  fantasy  under  the  mul- 
berry's blossoms, 

Where  he  sat  down  on  the  settle  so  cunning- 
ly woven  of  grapevines, 

Visioning  there  a  shape  to  be  present  and 
waiting  to  meet  him. 


Suddenly    neard    he    adream    the    echoing 

strokes  of  the  school-bell 
Which  by  its  bodeful  vibration  shook  him 

out  of  his  ghost-world, 
So  that  he  leaped  from  his  seat  and  uttered 

a  word  disappointed: 


210     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X. 

"No,  not  yet,  not  yet,  though  such  be  my 

hope  of  fulfilment ; 
First  I  must  go  to  my  mother  before  I  can 

ever  be  happy. 

Step-mother  though  she  be,  more  compell- 
ing than  blood  is  our  kinship. 
Though  she  bore  not  my  body  at  birth,  she 

mothered  my  genius, 
Having  a  seeress's  glance  which  can  look  in 

the  glass  of  the  future." 
This  he  would  hear  from  her  lips  just  after 

his  earliest  inning, 
Spoken  in  love  from  the  deepest  communion 

of  spirits  united, 
For  she  could  draw  up  a  sybilline  word  from 

sources  eternal. 


So  the  traveler  trudges  his  way  with  the 
landscape  conversing, 

Which  would  silently  tell  him  its  tale,  reflect- 
ing his  humor 

In  the  play  of  the  color  spread  over  the  mea- 
dow and  hillside, 

In  the  laugh  of  the  buds  as  they  burst  to  the 
fullness  of  flowers, 

In  the  joy  of  the  sunshine  fleeting  with 
fleeces  of  cloudland 

Which  run  racing  in  golden  processions 
around  the  blue  welkin. 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  £11 

Once  he  turned  to  the  field  as  he  heard  the 
words  of  the  plowman 

Who  would  talk  to  his  team  in  a  language 
well  known  to  the  horses 

While  they  turned  up  the  soil  for  planting 
the  crop  of  the  future. 

Lincoln  himself  would  grapple  the  plow  by 
the  curve  of  the  handle, 

Cluck  his  command  to  the  quadrupeds  lazily 
lagging, 

Till  they  had  drawn  round  the  field  the  plow- 
share's  quadrangular  furrows, 

Which  were  soon  to  be  combed  into  shape 
by  the  currying  harrow, 

When  would  be  dropped  and  covered  the 
grains  of  the  corn  in  the  hillock, 

Four  of  them  rightly,  according  to  trans- 
mitted wont  of  the  farmer. 


Next  on  his  journey  he  came  to  the  huts  de- 
cayed of  the  Indian, 

Wreckage  of  what  was  once  a  well-filled  abor- 
iginal village, 

Pitiful  remnants  left  of  the  red  race  now 
going  to  pieces, 

Which  recalled  to  his  memory  scenes  in  the 
war  against  Black  Hawk. 

Sympathy  welled  from  his  heart  at  the  trag- 
edy of  a  whole  people, 


212     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  Z. 

Who  seemed  wilting  to  death  at  sight  of  the 

poisonous  White-face— 
People  whose  skins  were  fate-dyed  into  their 

coppery  color, 
Able  no  longer  to  stem  the  furious  tide  of 

migration 
Which  already  had  swept  them  far  over  the 

broad  Mississippi. 


Look!  here  rolls  a  fresh  fill  of  the  westerly1 

current  of  people, 
Through   this   Indian  village  which   seems 

but  a  piece  of  old  driftwood 
Stranded  along  the  river,  and  soon  to  van- 
ish forever, 
Sinking  beneath  the  high  overflow's  flood  of 

the  emigrant  wagons 
Which  are  now  bearing  the  tenants  to  dwell 

in  the  land  of  the  future: 
These,  by  the  traveler  met,  are  moving  in 

every  direction, 
Plodding   along   through    the   mud    of   the 

prairie  with  ox-team  or  draught-horse, 
Or  perchance  encamped  for  the  night  by  a 

spring  or  a  runnel, 
Where  a  fire  is  lit  in  the  brushwood  for 

cooking  the  supper. 
Deep  ran  that  stream  of  the  folk  who  were 

'quitting  the  country  where  settled, 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  £13 

And  instinctively  sweeping  in  shoals  to  the 

borderland's  front-line 
As  if  they  mightily  wrought  for  a  continent's 

quick  transformation, 
Turning  it  to  the  abode  of  civilized  life  from 

the  savage. 


Lincoln  had  likewise  driven  his  yoke  of  la- 
borious oxen, 

When  with  his  people  he  came  in  his  youth 
to  the  Sangamon  country. 

Thus  he  beheld  a  part  of  himself  in  this 
search  for  the  sunset, 

Still  he  could  feel  in  his  soul  the  prick  of 
the  lust  of  migration ; 

Such  an  experience  was  his,  and  that  of  his 
ancestors  also, 

Who  had  ever  vanguarded  their  race  in  its 
march  to  the  westward. 


Now  his  journey  has  led  to  the  door  of  his 

father's  log  cabin, 
Primitive  home   of  the  frontier,   standing 

alone  on  the  prairie, 
Prairie  called  Little  Goose-Neck,  by  some 

fanciful  humor. 
There  on  the  sill  stood  the  mother  who  had 

sprung  up  from  her  spinning — 


214     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X. 

But  the  step-mother  was  she,  the  merciful, 

Sally  Bush  Lincoln — 
That  she  might  welcome  the  son  of  her  soul 

though  not  of  her  body. 


Lincoln  lovingly  tarried  e'en  in  his  haste  to 

return  home, 
Whither  another  true  love  was  wooingly 

winging  him  onward, 
And  the  good  mother  presaged  it,  bespeaking 

her  sibylline  spirit: 
''So  your  career  has  begun  its  first  stride 

in  its  mounting  up  starward. 
Well  did  I  know  it,  forecasting  your  bent  by 

the  deeds  of  your  boyhood, 
As  you  lay  on  the  floor  in  the  light  of  the 

hickory  firewood 
Conning  the  print  of  your  book  till  the  hour 

of  midnight  was  over. 
This  is  but  the  beginning  and  many  a  step 

you  will  take  yet, 
But  along  with  the  steps  as  you  rise  smite 

the  backstrokes  of  sorrow; 
Son  of  my  spirit,  now  march  to  your  des- 
tiny's goal  as  a  victor, 
But  I  forefeel  it— your  life  will  be  full  of 

high  triumphs  woe-laden." 


SACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  215 

So  she  was  reading  his  soul  and  its  stress 

with  a  sibyl's  precision, 
When  in  her  mood  she  oracled  new  the  grim 

fates  of  existence: 
"Let  me  confess — on  myself  I  see  lettered 

your  lot  in  its  outline ; 
I  have  known  the  sweet  hap  and  the  mishap 

of  love  and  of  marriage. 
Mine  is  in  small  what  yours  is  in  large,  oh! 

Fate,  in  the  largest ! 
I  peruse  on  my  own  soul  what  you  are  to  be 

in  the  future, 
Only  magnified  thousands   of  times  is  the 

luminous  print  there, 
When  I  behold  you  here  standing  before  me 

within  this  cribbed  cabin; 
Still  the  tragedy  greater  is  yours,  my  heart's 

son — I  see  it!" 


There  aside  she  had  turned  to  fling  down  a 

tear  on  the  hearth-stone, 
Lincoln  was  startled,  and  yet  sympathetic 

far  down  he  responded, 
For  he  too  had  felt  out  the  end  in  the  gloom 

of  his  being ; 
But  the  mother  came  back  with  a  thought  she 

had  left  still  unspoken: 
"I  can  see  that  you  wish  to  hurry  away  to 

New  Salem; 


216     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  X. 

Well   do   I  know   the   little   live   loadstone 
drawing  you  thither. 

Abe,  the  girl  that  you  love  I  saw  when  she 
shone  out  the  best  one — 

For  I  marked  all  of  her  turns  as  she  gave 
you  the  sword  of  her  fathers 

When  you  went  to  the  war  intending  to  bat- 
tle with  Black  Hawk ; 

Young  and  beautiful,  aye  too  beautiful  ever 
to  last  long, 

And  I  could  trace  in  each  dart  of  her  tremu- 
lous eye  the  heart's  struggle, 

Which  had  begun  to  look  out  underneath  the 
fair  lines  of  her  features. 

I  shall  remember  her  as  a  bright  soul  on  her 
way  up  to  Heaven, 

Yet  her  lot  is  like  yours,  and  mine  not  unlike 
I  can  see  it, 

But  foremoulded  to  yours  by  love  is  her  des- 
tiny's outcome — 

Love  that  is  deeper  than  mine,  and  grown  of 
a  different  soul-seed, 

Love  that  passes  from  Life  through  Death 
for  its  fiery  trial. 

0  blest  boy,  I  hear  it  foredoomed  me  that  I 
shall  survive  thee!" 


Down  drooped  his  head  upon  hers  in  re- 
sponse to  the  might  of  her  presage. 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  217 

So  they  parted  in  mutual  love  the  future 
forefeeling. 

Lincoln  went  out  to  the  field  to  visit  awhile 
with  his  father, 

Whom  he  assisted  to  hoe  to  a  finish  a  patch 
of  potatoes, 

Giving  him  also  some  dollars  out  of  the  law- 
giver's stipend. 

Then  they  bade  to  each  other  goodbye,  with 
kind  wishes  of  welfare, 

For  the  son  and  the  father  could  hold  no  in- 
ner communion, 

Child  of  the  flesh  refusing  all  kinship  with 
child  of  the  spirit, 

Who  was  mothered  by  step-mother,  but  was 
step-fathered  by  father. 


Down  the  road  turned  Lincoln,  thinking  on 
all  that  had  happened, 

Chiefly  revolving  the  prairial  seeress's  vati- 
cination, 

For  it  tuned  with  his  own  far  down  in  his 
being  unconscious. 

Slowly  the  afternoon  sank  into  night  with 
the  lowering  sunset 

Whither  the  young  man  seemed  to  himself  to 
be  journeying  forthright, 

Inward  and  outward  into  the  vale  of  the 
shadow  eternal, 


218         LINCOLN  AND  ANN'  RUT  LEDGE, —BOOK  X. 

Till  the  pedestrian  weary  lay  down  to  his 
dreams  on  a  hay-stack. 


When  he  awoke  the  sunrise  was  laughing 
straight  into  his  darkness; 

Soon  with  temper  renewed  by  a  cheerful 
meal  at  a  farm  house 

Lightly  he  trod  on  the  road  as  it  wound  with 
the  leaf-shaded  brooklet, 

Now  in  his  mood's  attunement  he  heark- 
ened the  soul  of  the  season. 


All  the  earth  was  a  hope  outbursting  in 

green  of  the  spring-tide; 
Songsters  in  every  bush  were  choiring  their 

festival's  music, 
Over  the  prairie  was  verdantly  spreading  the 

velvety  ocean 
Through  whose  level  of  waves  the  deer  would 

fleet  in  the  distance, 
Oft    the   wild-fowl   would    suddenly    whirr 

overhead  and  then  drop  down 
Into  the  tangle  of  brushwood  whence  would 

spring  out  the  squirrel ; 
Even  the  cloud  was  clad  in  its  gold-lace  and 

fringes  of  Heaven, 

While  with  Spring  the  glad  hills  were  fes- 
tooned for  Love's  holiday  happy. 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  £19 

Inside  the  high-domed  mansion  of  welkin 

and  prairie  encircled 
Lincoln  was  wending  his  way  uphearted  with 

happiness  lofty, 
Vibrating  through  and  through  to  the  thrill 

of  Nature's  caresses, 
Feeling  the  heart  of  himself  responsive  to 

beats  of  the  world's  heart. 


Every  step  was  an  image  until  he  had 
reached  the  headwaters 

Where  he  heard  the  first  infantile  prattle  of 
Sangamon's  streamlet — 

His  dear  Sangamon,  hurrying  onward  to 
come  to  New  Salem — 

Like  himself  in  its  longing  which  he  could 
feel  in  each  bubble 

Restlessly  rushing  to  kiss  the  fresh  face  of 
the  village's  hillside. 

Lincoln  kept  pace  with  the  passionate  stream 
in  light-lifted  footsteps, 

Feeling  companionship  intimate  which  was 
conversing  unworded 

Through  all  the  tortuous  twists  and  whimsi- 
cal whirls  of  the  water. 

He  would  lie  down  on  the  sedge  of  the  brook 
in  a  well- shaded  dingle, 

Where  he  would  list  to  himself  and  the  rip- 
ples in  secret  communion. 


220     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  X. 

Hark !  a  new  sound !  there  is  wafted  a  musi- 
cal wavelet  of  tinkles! 

Faintly  they  flit  on  his  ear,  as  light  as  the 
fall  of  a  snowflake, 

Weaving  their  notes  with  the  mood  of  the 
Sangamon's  murmurs  in  concord. 

There !  once  more  that  waf ture  of  tones !  oh 
list !  His  the  school-bell 

Into  whose  outermost  circle  of  sound  thrill- 
ing echoes  concentric 

Lincoln  has  entered  with  heart  strings  tuned 
to  the  wavelets  sonorous. 


See,  he  comes  to  a  knoll,  from  whose  height 
he  descries  a  proud  mansion 

Nestling  its  roof  within  the  umbrageous  em- 
brace of  the  tree-tops, 

"Where  is  the  high-pillared  home  of  the  Lady 
Eulalia  Lovelace. 

There  he  thought  of  stopping  a  moment  to 
greet  the  high  hostess, 

Who  had  loyally  answered  the  letters  he 
sent  from  Vandalia, 

But  he  sees  some  distance  ahead  the  mul- 
berry shade-tree 

With  all  its  branches  outleaved  and  blooming 
in  flowery  splendor. 

That  whole  tree  seems  to  titter  in  love  which 
tingles  his  bosom, 


BACK  FROM  CAPITAL.  £21 

And  he  steps  more  exalted  along  on  the 
boards  of  the  side-walk 

As  he  approaches  the  shrine  of  many  a  hal- 
lowed meeting. 

Soon  he  takes  a  fresh  step  round  the  turn  of 
a  fence  by  the  roadside 

When  there  dawns  on  his  eye-glance  search- 
ing the  seat  of  the  grapevines 

Made  by  himself  in  a  moment  presageful 
of  hope's  sweet  fulfilment — 

What  can  it  be?  'Tis  something  that 
moves — a  dress  and  a  bonnet ! 

Decking  the  form  of  a  woman  half  hid  in  the 
leaves  of  the  branches! 

Look!  she  has  risen  and  seems  to  give  a  sa- 
lute in  the  distance, 

First  recognizing  the  stalwart  figure  and 
then  too  the  garment 

Woven  in  love  on  the  loom  by  her  hand  and 
her  heart  as  her  handsel; 

While  he  comes  up,  she  steps  to  the  front 
from  the  leafage — who  is  it? 


00k 


Under  the  Mulberry. 

''When  the  leaves  of  this  treetop  peeped 
fluttering  into  my  eyesight, 

You  I  held  in  my  heart  and  hoped  for  the 
bloom  of  your  presence." 

Lincoln  had  stepped  from  the  roadway  while 
these  words  he  was  saying, 

Till  he  stood  underneath  the  silk-green  mul- 
berry's leafage 

Which  with  the  flowers  paired  was  whirling 
in  dance  to  the  breezes. 


Airily  rising  and  taking  her  place  in  front 

of  the  comer, 
Spake   through   blushes    the   maid,    as    she 

glanced  up  into  his  features: 
(222) 


UNDER  THE  MULBERRY.  223 

"And  I  too,  when  I  first  came  hither  today 
and  lounged  on  this  settle, 

More  than  an  hour  ago,  I  seemed  to  grow 
into  the  earth  here 

Dreaming  that  you  would  soon  be  espied  on 
the  road  from  Vandalia." 

"And  I  too  was  dreaming  of  you  on  this  set- 
tle reclining 

When  my  love-born  imagery  slips  into  being 
before  me ; 

Softly  there  starts  to  sing  me  a  note  far 
sweeter  than  music. " 


"Also  my  fancy  was  watching  you  walk  in 
your  cloudland  of  fancy, 

When  you  stepped  right  out  of  the  ghost- 
world  into  my  presence, 

As  I  dreamed  you  dreaming  my  dream  of 
happiness  future." 

"Also  my  fancy  saw  yours  and  the  shapes 
which  it  joyously  played  with, 

For  they  were  mine  and  seemed  in  their  love 
to  know  one  another. 

Tell  me,  are  we  a  phantom,  or  even  a  phan- 
tom of  phantoms?" 


So  they  had  come  together  again  at  the  shrine 
of  their  trysting, 


224    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XI. 

After  a  long  separation  of  space  but  not  of 

the  spirit. 
Even  though  here  in  the  body,  they  could 

not  come  out  of  their  dreamland 
Where  they  had  happily  lived,  to  each  other 

in  freedom  united, 
Far   from   the    conflict    of   life   which   had 

hounded  them  both  like  a  Fury. 
Lincoln  in  hope  looked  out  of  himself  for  a 

view  of  kind  nature, 
If  she  would  deign  him  perchance  a  breath  of 

her  loving  suggestion: 

"Watch  this  mulberry  tree  with  its  rollick- 
ing leaflets  and  flowers! 
Oft   underneath    these   branches   we    twain 

have  attuned  our  best  moments, 
What  does  it  say  to  us  now  foretelling  the 

cast  of  our  fortune?" 


Fairily    lifted    the    maiden    her    hand    and 

plucked  a  bright  blossom 
Pinning  it  on  the  lapel  of  his  coat  whose 

threads  she  had  woven, 
Saying  with  eyebeams  outpoured:  "It  smiles 

you  a  bright  benediction." 
Lincoln  again  for  relief  fled  into  the  joys  of 

the  season: 
"Not  alone  this  mulberry  blooms  in  a  vernal 

carousal, 


UNDER  THE  MULBERRY.  225 

But  the  fields  and  the  woods  have  shot  up 
heavenward  striving. 

Look !  the  earth  and  the  welkin  sink  down  in 
each  other's  embraces 

All  around  the  horizon  which  hides  them  be- 
hind its  blue  curtain. 

Birds  are  singing  and  mating  and  making 
their  nests  for  the  future, 

Herds  are  mad  with  the  season  and  frolic- 
the  day  through  the  meadow, 

Bees  are  buzzing  high-hearted  amid  the  flow- 
ering tree-tops, 

I  can  hear  them  at  work  now,  humming  of 
hives  and  of  honey." 


Here  the  word  waited  awhile  in  the  lull  of  his 

sympathy's  silence, 
"While  the  youth  and  the  maiden  were  sunk 

in  the  throb  of  the  spring's  spell; 
But  soon  Lincoln  was  striking  the  keynote 

of  Heaven  outside  him, 
And  inside  him  as  well,  the  outer  preluding 

the  inner: 
"Mark  too  the  azure  eye  that  is  tenderly 

rounded  above  us ! 
Now  it  is  hiding  its  blue  with  a  white  woolly 

flock  of  a  cloudlet, 
Passionate  longing  it  looks,  but  modestly 

keeps  in  the  distance." 


226     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XL 

Then  the  coy  maiden  drew  closer  and  dar- 
ingly whispered  the  answer: 

"See  the  bold  bright  face  of  the  sun  while 
he  pours  out  his  glances 

On  the  earth  all  his  bride,  and  tells  her  the 
gold  of  his  treasures." 

Both  of  them  drooped  down  together  into 
the  seat  of  the  grapevines, 

Wide  enough  seat  for  the  one,  yet  narrow 
for  two,  still  both  sat  down, 

Quite  as  one  person  the  twain  seemed  bent 
to  the  sides  of  each  other, 

"While  the  mulberry's  flowers  hung  downward 
and  smiled  at  the  lovers 

Just  like  themselves  now  blooming  their  hour 
at  height  of  the  season, 

Half  concealed  in  their  glory  behind  the 
tapestry  leafy. 


Thus  they  sat  in  their  bower  alone  and  felt 

their  new  freedom, 
Silent  they  gazed  on  each  other,  but  silence 

was  fuller  than  speeches 
Till  it  burst  overflowing  to  words  from  the 

heart  of  Ann  Eutledge : 
"Long  I  have  secretly  hoped,  I  confess,  for 

the  turn  of  this  moment, 
Aye,  ever  since  I  beheld  the  brave  youth  take 

his  boat  through  the  milldam." 


UNDER  THE  MULBERRY.  227 

Lincoln  replied:    "I  saw  the  fair  form  that 

stood  on  the  hillside 
Waving  her  handkerchief  thrice  and  again — 

I  could  go  to  the  spot  now — 
Oft  I  have  gone  there  and  looked  at  myself 

in  the  years  intervening, 
With  a  hope  in  my  heart — a  hope  but  not  a 

fulfillment — 
Deeply  I  longed  for  it,  still  I  never  expected 

this  moment." 
"Then  on  that  day,"  fell  slowly  the  words 

of  the  maid  to  a  falter, 
'  *  Then  on  that  day  when  I  girded  thee  round 

with  the  sword  of  my  fathers, 
Thee,  young  Captain,  that  moment  I  dreamed 

thee  my  hero  forever." 


So  in  their  soul's  own  spring-time  they  sat 

with  ecstasy  thrilling, 
When  the  maiden  uplifted  her  hand  to  stroke 

a  caress  on  his  forearm, 
Or  to  pick  off  a  gossamer  caught  in  the  nap 

of  his  garment — 
Of  a  sudden  the  face  of  the  youth  grew  dark 

as  the  cloud-wrack, 
Even  the  sigh  burst  up  from  the  far-down 

source  of  his  being, 
As  he  rolled  round  his  eye  and  glanced  at  the 

ring  on  her  finger 


228    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE—BOOK  XL 

Whose   red  ruby  seemed  flashing   a   curse 

whenever  he  saw  it. 
Wincing  with  memory's    pitiless    pain    he 

worded  his  sorrow : 

"But  the  counterstroke  felled  me  when  I  re- 
turned from  my  absence, 
For  I  found  the  dear  prize  had  meanwhile 

been  won  by  my  rival." 
Ann  heaved  a  sob  which  rose  from  her  soul 

like  the  roll  of  the  tide-wave, 
E'en  a  low  shriek  she  voiced  with  her  breath 

in  the  stress  of  her  struggle, 
As  she  jerked  back  her  finger  encircled  with 

pledge  of  betrothal. 
Then  she  grappled  that  ring  of  her  fate  and 

she  wrenched  it : 
* '  Off,  off,  and  out  of  my  sight !  I  ban  thee  not 

to  be  mine  more!" 

So  she  reproached  it:     "Thou  sign  of  de- 
spair at  my  happiest  moment!" 
But  it  fought  her  and  stayed,  though  she 

bloodied  the  knob  of  her  knuckle 
In  her  fierce  writhing  to  loose  from  its  clench 

that  symbol  of  promise. 
Soon  she  stopped  and  wilted  in  look  to  sad 

resignation 
Quite  unable  to  put  from  her  hand  or  her 

heaven  the  token: 
"Fain  I  would  now  be  quit  of  it,  but  it  never 

will  leave  me." 


UNDER  THE  MULBERRY.  £29 

Sorrowful,  Lincoln  was  soothing  the  rage  of 
the  maidenly  battle, 

When  she  fell  on  his  bosom  and  coupled  her 
own  to  his  heart-beat, 

Till  they  both  were  transfused  to  one  soul 
that  could  never  be  parted. 

Thus  they  lay  in  the  lull  of  their  Paradise, 
when  the  youth  whispered: 

"He,  the  absentee,  Abner,  will  never  come 
back  by  my  presage ; 

You  have  not  yet  received  the  reply  I  un- 
willingly wrote  for?" 

With  a  short  jet  of  a  scream  upwhirling  from 
life's  last  fountain, 

Forth  she  drew  from  her  pocket  the  writ 
which  she  crushed  in  a  crackle 

Till  her  well-flourished  name  on  the  paper 
was  furrowed  to  creases : 

"Yes,  here  it  is,"  and  she  broke,  as  if  march- 
ing to  death,  the  envelope : 

"He  is  soon  to  return — perchance  he  is  now 
in  New  Salem." 


Terror  shook  the  brave  man  when  he  saw  all 

his  world  fall  in  ruins ; 
Hope,  the  newborn  star  of  his  life,  dropped 

dead  like  a  cinder; 
Agony  wrung  every  limb  in  his  frame  with 

the  rage  of  a  demon; 


230    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XI. 

But  suppress  it  lie  must,  so  lie  spoke  oui 

calmly  resigning: 
''Heaven  be  witness!  eternal  must  be  oui 

renunciation ! ' ' 
So  he  appeals  as  if  facing  just  there  all  tht 

fates  of  existence. 


But  at  the  shock  of  the  word  Ann  seizes  the 
doom-bringing  letter, 

And  she  tears  it  to  pieces  again  and  again  in 
her  frenzy, 

Flinging  the  ominous  fragments  away  from 
herself  by  the  handful, 

Seeming  to  spurn  in  disdain  each  inked  little 
shred  of  the  missive. 

But  just  see !  the  papery  flock  flung  out  on  the 
breezes ! 

One  wee  whirl  of  the  eddying  wind  is  whisk- 
ing the  fragments 

Back  to  the  seat  and  e  'en  to  the  hand  of  the 
maid  which  had  whirled  them, 

And  they  besprinkle  with  speckles  the  gar- 
ment of  Abraham  Lincoln 

Which  for  him  she  had  woven  before  he  went 
down  to  Vandalia. 

Aye,  they  even  dared  fly  in  his  face  with  the 
twirl  of  the  whirlwind, 

One  of  them  lights  in  his  eye,  to  blind  him 
the  way  of  the  future. 


UNDER  THE  MULBERRY.  231 

Up  he  springs  and  shakes  off  the  bits  of  im- 
pertinent paper 

Which  had  defiantly  come  in  the  way  of  his 
highest  fulfillment, 

While  through  his  face  are  fixed  tense  lines 
of  his  determination, 

Though  around  them  the  tenderest  looks  of 
his  love  throb  trembling. 

Dares  he  meet  the  new  crisis?  Let  destiny 
vengefully  smite  him — 

Taking  his  seat  he  clasps  the  maid  to  his 
bosom  in  transport; 

Boldly  he  spares  not  the  kiss,  the  kiss  of 
eternal  betrothal, 

Which  she  gives  back  to  him  twice  and  thrice 
in  fiery  rapture, 

While  she  whispers  a  word  from  her  heart 
for  acceptance  of  Heaven, 

Mid  her  tear-drops  falling  and  sighs  up- 
storming  she  prays  there : 

1 1  Thou  Almighty,  oh !  tell  me,  can  this  be  my 
second  betrothal?" 


Then  she  fell,  as  if  severed  within  by  her 
promises  double. 

Lincoln  calmed  himself  for  the  sake  of  calm- 
ing the  maiden, 

Bade  her  look  up  to  partake  of  the  joy  of  the 
mulberry  blossoms 


232    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XI. 

Which  all  day  were  blooming  their  love  to 

the  world  and  its  lovers, 
Every  branch  was  waving  above  them  the 

leaves  of  a  garland, 
Backward  and  forward  attuned  to  the  harp 

of  the  low-piping  breezes, 
With  which  whistled  the  robin  his  note  now 

and  then  from  the  tree-top, 
While    the    sparrows    would    twitter   their 

speeches  and  beak  one  another, 
Also  debating  of  Love  as  they  sat  in  their 

parliament  feathered. 
Mid  such  music  he  breathed  in  the  ear  of  the 

maiden  a  whisper : 
"Now  Love's  truth  and   Love's   troth   are 

joined  in  a  union  forever, 
While  the  hope  of  the  heart  grows  one  with 

the  tongue  and  its  promise, 
And  the  holiest  wish  to  the  word  runs  coun- 
ter no  longer. " 


Scarcely  had  sounded  the  tones  of  Lincoln's 

happy  concordance, 
When  she  lifted  her  palm  to  place  it  in  his 

for  the  blessing — 
What  is  this  sudden  convulsion !  witness  the 

act  of  Ann  Eutledge, 
As  she  holds  up  one  hand  to  his  gaze  and  the 

finger  ring  on  it 


UNDER  THE  MULBERRY.  £33 

Whose  dumb  look  he  well  understands  in  its 

sinister  meaning, 
Which  now  quakes  each  joint  of  his  body  in 

shudders  repeated. 
Then  the  maiden  begins  to  wrench  off  that 

sign  of  her  promise 
More  ferocious  than  ever  before  against  its 

refusal ; 
But  it  clings  fast  with  mortal  embrace  in  her 

flesh,  in  her  soul  too, 
Dumbly  affirming  its  place  by  the  right  of 

the  primal  betrothal. 
But  at  a  twist  the  red-teared  ruby  leaps  out 

of  its  socket 

Sailing  unseen  far  off  in  the  grass  or  per- 
chance in  the  bushes. 
"Let  it  go,"  she  spake  with  decision,  "no 

longer  I  wish  it, 
All  that  heart  has  shot  out  my  ring  and  out 

of  myself  too, 
Let  this  sign  on  my  finger  now  stay  as  it  is 

— heartless." 


List !  to  the  shock  of  her  word  comes  tolling 
the  sound  of  the  school-bell, 

Bringing  to  both  of  the  lovers  the  eventide's 
message  unwelcome, 

For  the  afternoon  hours  already  had  slid  off 
unheeded. 


234     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XL 

Lincoln  sprang  up  in  a  shiver  hearing  the 
bodeful  vibrations, 

Saying:  "Now  I  must  part,  there  is  tonight 
a  discussion — 

That's  the  first  call  of  the  bell — I  hurried  to- 
day to  be  present." 


Still  he  lingered  and  sat  down  again  with  the 
maid  on  the  settle, 

Who  recalled  the  memories  sweet  of  the  lit- 
tle red  schoolhouse, 

When  their  heads  and  their  hearts  first  en- 
twined in  the  rapture  of  study. 

But  once  more  interrupted  their  talk  that 
echoing  belfry 

As  they  lurked  half-hid  in  the  gauze  of  the 
leaves  of  their  bower, 

Bidding  them  part  and  follow  away  in  the 
wake  of  the  sound-waves. 

"Well-aday!  now  I  am  off,"  leaped  Lincoln 
from  under  the  leafage, 

Tenderly  breathing  a  sigh,  ere  he  sped,  on 
the  lips  of  Ann  Eutledge, 

Though  he  marked  the  agony  tearing  her  face 
as  he  left  her. 


Then  alone,  as  was  best,  he  turned  down  the 
road  to  the  village, 


UNDER  THE  MULBERRY.  £35 

Soon  he  had  dodged  out  of  sight,  though 
glancing  furtively  backward, 

Darting  afar  a  sunburst  of  love,  which  again 
made  her  happy. 


Now  by  herself  the  maiden  slipped  off  to  the 
home  of  her  parents, 

Lightly  uplifted  in  tread  at  the  start  and  ex- 
ultant of  spirit. 

But  on  her  way  she  saw  the  white  storehouse 
of  Abner  the  absent, 

Bead  his  name  on  the  sign-board  lettered  in 
front  of  the  building, 

Then  came  the  back-stroke  again  with  the 
pitiless  might  of  her  conflict, 

Whelming  her  more  than  ever  down  into  the 
den  of  the  Furies 

As  she  reflected:  "My  doom  is  fallen,  I  feel 
it  redoubled, 

Mark  it  rise  upward !  two  letters,  two  lovers, 
and  now  two  betrothals! 

How  the  scythe  of  old  Time  keeps  halving  me 
deeper  and  deeper!" 

Soon  she  had  crossed  the  doorsill,  and  silent- 
ly entered  her  chamber, 

Throwing  herself  on  her  bed,  she  drew  forth 
the  red-hearted  letter, 

And  at  its  glance  rose  murmuring  words 
from  her  nethermost  fountain 


236     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XI. 

As  she  prayerful  seemed  to  address  an  in- 
visible presence : 
"Soon  I  shall  take  thy  letter  along  to  my 

bridal  hereafter 
When  I  shall  come  before  God  on  His  throne 

with  my  love  everlasting, 
And  beseech  Him  in  mercy  divinely  to  seal 

my  espousals. 
Though  of  earth  be  the  law  of  my  word,  I 

shall  not  disobey  it, 
Eather  now  let  me  be  crushed  by  the  weight 

of  its  honest  fulfillment, 
Only  beyond  I  go  free  of  the  chain  of  my 

primal  betrothal. 
I  shall  hold  up  this  letter  of  thine  in  the 

presence  of  Heaven, 
Hold  it  up  with  the  hand  here  gyved  by  this 

ring  on  my  finger, 
I  shall  show  it  as  pledge  of  fidelity's  oath  to 

my  conscience, 
Yet  too  as  sign  of  my  love  triumphant  for 

thee  in  all  struggle. 
There  on  high  a  new  ring  will  be  given  me, 

ring  of  betrothal 
Which  I  shall  wear  at  the  Judgment  of  Man, 

as  the  sign  of  salvation." 


So  the  maiden  lay  glooming  her  forecast  in 
dim  premonition, 


UNDER  THE  MULBERRY.  237 

When  half  adream  she  seemed  to  be  hearing 

the  voice  of  the  preacher 
Weirdly  attuning  the  air  to  the  words  of  a 

musical  whisper: 
"God  is  deathless  Love,  whose  fulfillment  is 

only  in  Heaven. " 


Soothingly  Ann's  whole  soul  had  slid  out 

of  time  to  a  vision, 
Which  repeated    that    sentence    again  and 

again  with  her  heart-throbs 
Till  in  her  flight  she  suddenly  winged  to  the 

Presence  Eternal, 
Who  as  Last  Judge  had  called  her  before  his 

final  tribunal. 
There  he  gazed  at  her  soul  with  its  love  in 

infinite  pity, 

Crowning  her  true  as  a  bride  with  the  lumi- 
nous garland  of  Heaven, 
He  as  High-Priest  supreme  of  the  Universe 

gave  her  in  marriage 
Stamping  the  love  of  God  Himself  on  the 

love  of  the  maiden; 
Thus  transfigured  to   truth  immortal    was 

truth  of  the  mortal. 


238    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XI. 

In  the  night  Ann  Kutledge  was  waked  from 

her  sleep  by  the  moon's  touch, 
Whose  fine  fingers  of  radiance  reached  forth 

lifting  her  eyelids, 
Gently  leading  her  back  once  more  to  her  life 

on  this  earth-ball ; 
But  she  was  ill,  and  she  woke  up  weak  from 

her  dream-world, 
For  a  fever  had  wrapped  in  its  blaze  her  face 

and  her  body 
And  was  burning  her  strength  when  to  rise 

from  her  bed  she  attempted. 
Dropping  back  on  her  pillow,  she  called  for 

help  from  her  mother, 
Who  soon  came  with  the  father  and  stood  on 

watch  at  the  bed-side. 


look 


The  Double  Debate. 

Twilight  of  eve  is  flinging  her  veil  transpar- 
ent, triumphant, 

Over  the  face  of  the  Earth  in  pursuit  of  her 
lover,  the  Sungod ; 

Swift  on  his  tracks  she  is  happily  smiling  in 
hope  to  o'ertake  him 

Ere  he  drop  underneath  the  last  rim  of  the 
rounded  horizon, 

Though  to  keep  her  afar  he  out-thrusts  the 
long  arms  of  his  sunbeams. 

Now  he  has  leaped  in  the  Ocean,  she  follow- 
ing rapidly  after, 

While  the  Ethiop  Night  has  slunk  down  the 
Sangamon  Valley 

And  is  sneaking  up  slowly  to  darken  the  hill 
of  New  Salem — 

(239) 


240   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RVTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

Hark!  there  is  heard  in  the  sky  overhead  a 
loud  detonation 

All  of  a  sudden,  the  Heavens  flash  full  of  the 
spatter  of  sparkles, 

Till  the  whole  dome  of  the  stars  seem  thun- 
dering out  of  their  orbits 

Into  some  cosmical  battle  which  fires  just  now 
its  first  cannon 

Over  the  village,  whose  people  are  quaking  in 
terrible  wonder, 

Palely  upturning  their  faces  and  asking: 
"What  is  it  the  sign  of  1" 


So  they  began  to  delve  in  themselves  for  an 

interpretation. 
Every  person  first  thought  of  some  ill  to 

himself  now  foreshadowed, 
Then  he  sought  to  review  all  the  deeds  he  had 

done  in  his  vengeance, 
And  he  could  find  them  swarming  on  each 

little  speck  of  existence, 
Till  he  fled  from    the    prospect    of  dream- 
wrought  damnation  in  terror. 
Then  he  would  think  of  his  family,  town,  of 

his  State  and  the  Nation, 
Soon   selecting  for  doom  what  he   deemed 

their  deed  most  infernal, 
Thus  in  himself  his  own  soul  was  turned  to 

a  scene  of  Last  Judgment. 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  241 

Even  the  world  was  felt  underneath  to  be 

shaky  by  many, 
Who  remembered  the  wrath  of  the  Lord  as 

pictured  by  Cartright, 
Furious  preacher  predicting  the  end  in  a 

grand  conflagration, 
Whereof  the  harbinger  hot  has  been  flared  in 

the  Heavens  as  warning. 
All  New  Salem  turned  prophet  inspired  by 

that  fire-ball  celestial, 
Dumbly  f orefeeling  its  fate,  the  hours  it  went 

about  ghost-like, 
Hanging  between  two  dreamworlds,  living  as 

though  in  a  fable. 


Even  calm  Lincoln  gave  rein  to  his  prognos- 
tication, 
Though  he  had  read  in  a  book  about  meteors 

madly  exploding 
When  they  tore  our  outermost  air  in  their 

swift  revolutions. 
So  he  believed  with  cold  science,  still  in  spite 

of  his  reason 
Rose  all  the  might  of  his  underworld  into  Bis 

sad  premonition ; 
What  the  ages  ancestral  had  laid  in  his  soul, 

was  the  stronger, 
For  it  was  tuned  to  the  time  which  seemed 

presaging  destruction, 


242   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE—BOOK  XII. 

Tuned  to  the  mood  of  the  village  forefeeling 

its  own  evanescence, 
Tuned  to  the  pang  of  his  love  with  its  woe  of 

remediless  conflict, 
Which  had  pierced  with  its  perilous  point  to1 

the  life  of  the  dearest. 

Even  the  bell  of  the  school-house  was  seem- 
ing to  gasp  from  its  belfry, 
Slowly  transmuting  its  strain  to  a  dirge  with 

a  resonance  dying 
Far  on  tKe  throbs  of  the  air  enringing  the 

village 's  hilltop ; 
Tolling  together  the  folk,  it  seemed  for  itself 

to  be  tolling, 
As  it  sighed  out  its  low  tintinnabular  hum  in 

the  distance. 


Slowly  the  people  uneasy  began  to  assemble 

together, 
Not  a  joke  would  prosper,  though  several 

hopefully  tried  it, 
Something  hung  heavily  over  the  world  both 

outer  and  inner, 
Silent  and  spectral  each  stalked  on  his  path 

to  the  school-house, 
Which  had  a  vanishing  look  as  it  sank  in  the 

dusk  of  the  night-tide. 
But  now  it  gleams  with  small  flares  lit  within 

from  candles  of  tallow, 


TSE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  243 

Long-fingered  candles  melted  and  cooled  on 

wicks  in  the  tin-molds, 
Shedding  a  flickering  flame  on  New  Salem 

instead  of  the  sunshine. 


Mentor  Graham  was  there  preparing  his  desk 
for  the  Chairman, 

Also  adjusting  the  seats  in  opposite  rows  for 
contestants, 

Who  would  come  to  debate  this  evening's 
question  appointed, 

"Which  of  the  two,  the  red  man  or  black,  has 
been  injured  more  deeply; 

Or  as  the  race-hating  borderer  in  his  harsh 
lingo  would  put  it : 

Which  of  the  curses  is  bigger  for  us,  the  In- 
jun or  Nigger? 


So  the  sage  schoolmaster  parted  the  places 
of  both  the  debaters, 

Lest  from  near-by  the  quick  blow  might  pur- 
sue the  sharp  word  of  the  speaker. 

All  predicted  a  white-hot  time  in  discussing 
the  question 

Which  reached  down  to  the  core  of  the  heart- 
iest hates  of  the  people, 

Yea  to  the  strifes  far  back  unrecorded  of 
origin  human, 


244   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE.—BOOK  XII. 

Giving  its  ultimate  task  of  atonement  to  civ- 
ilization— 

To  associate  in  love  the  venomous  blood  of 
the  races. 


Troubled  in  foresight  the  master  has  hidden 
the  long  iron  poker, 

Also  the  slates  and  the  inkstands  of  lead 
were  unseen  in  their  places, 

Lest  as  weapons  to  clinch  some  argument 
they  might  be  seized  on. 

But  the  ferule  he  kept  in  his  hand,  the  badge 
of  his  calling, 

While  he  left  overhead  the  small  switch  of 
flexible  willow, 

Which  would  tickle  the  palm  of  the  bad  little 
boy  caught  in  mischief. 

All  the  shreds  of  paper  and  whittlings  which 
littered  the  deal-floor 

He  had  swept  together  with  care  and  thrown 
in  the  wood-box, 

Which  had  been  used  for  various  contents — 
quids  of  tobacco, 

Broken  old  pipestems,  corn-cobs,  emptied  bot- 
tles of  whiskey — 

Implements  social  of  all  frontiersmen  wher- 
ever assembled. 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  245 

Into  that  wood-box  also  was  flung  the  live 

snuff  of  the  candles, 
Which  the  farmer  would  crop  with  his  finger 

and  thumb,  without  snuffers, 
Suddenly  slapping  his  hand  on  his  thigh,  the 

burn  to  get  rid  of. 
Wisely  the  schoolmaster  read  in  advance  the 

mind  of  his  people, 
Bead  it  in  light  of  himself,  for  he  felt  in  his 

heart  the  same  conflict, 
Well  did  he  know  that  he  too  could  be  stormed 

in  this  struggle  of  races. 
Now  foreboding  the  strife  of  debate,  himself 

he  foreboded, 
If  some  witling  should  twit  him  and  make  him 

boil  over  with  passion, 
While  he  was  speaking  the  part  assigned  him 

on  side  of  the  negro 

For  an  old  memory  left  him  a  sizzling  vol- 
cano down  under. 


Meanwhile  knots  of  the  folk  were  standing 

around  the  lit  schoolhouse, 
Talking  of  matters  of  neighborhood  gossip, 

of  crops  and  of  business ; 
But  each  whispered  that  portent  of  Heaven, 

the  meteor  blazing; 
Featured  in  awe  was  his  face,  while  he  spake 

in  an  undertone  solemn, 


246  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  XII. 

Darkly  forefeeling  a  fate  to  lurk  in  the  pres- 
age uncanny, 

Worse  for  his  knowing  not  what,  but  certain- 
ly something  prodigious. 


Still  one  group  cared  not  for  the  ominous 
sign  of  the  fire-ball, 

That  was  Doctor  Palmetto,  a  group  of  him- 
self, ever  grumbling, 

Bitter  denier  of  all,  denying  at  last  his  de- 
nial, 

Who  said  No  to  the  sign  and  to  everything 
else  but  his  No  Sir, 

Even  to  that  in  the  end,  if  you  gave  him  the 
time  to  get  round  to't — 

Loudly  proclaiming  his  freedom  through  sci- 
ence from  all  superstition, 

He  had  already  begun  the  wrangle  outside  on 
the  darkey, 

But  he  secretly  aimed  his  poisonous  squibs 
at  his  rival, 

Lincoln,  who  had  not  yet  appeared,  though 
expected  as  speaker. 

All  for  his  advent  were  waiting  as  for  the 
soul  in  their  body: 

''Where  is  our  Abraham,  usually  prompt 
with  his  pouch  full  of  stories?" 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  241 

So  they  kept  looking  around  with  an  eye-shot 
at  every  newcomer : 

"Where  is  our  lawmaker  Lincoln  to  right- 
fully lead  the  discussion  ? 

Surely  the  bottom  will  fall  out  unless  he  be 
present  as  spokesman.'* 

So  they  hummed  through  the  groups,  one 
hummer  alone  was  discordant, 

Humming  his  Nay  to  it  all  until  himself  he 
benayed  too. 


Well-a-way!  up  from  the  store  is  walking  a 

man  unexpected, 

Long  since  known  in  the  town,  but  this  morn- 
ing returned  from  his  absence — 
Store-keeper  Abner,  0  Fate!  for  years  the 

betrothed  of  Ann  Eutledge! 
Bound  him  was  raging  her  destiny's  battle 

with  love  and  with  promise, 
Woe-darting  center  of  conflict  for  her  and 

also  for  Lincoln. 
All  saluted  him,  but  with  reserve,  which  he 

could  not  help  noting, 
So  he  appeared  not  hearty  in  answer  as  once 

his  frank  wont  was, 
Well  he  knew  that  the  people  all  minded  his 

unexplained  conduct, 
Taking  the  part  of  the  maid,  the  favorite 

fair  of  the  village. 


248   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

Not  a  word  he  vouchsafed  in  excuse,  and  no- 
body asked  him; 

Only  one  wag  dared  break  a  sly  jest  on  his 
sudden  appearance : 

"Ab,  was  it  you  that  popped  down  on  our 
earth  from  the  crack  of  that  comet? 

Well,  no  wonder  it  burst  into  thunder  with 
you  in  its  belly." 

Still  not  a  word  he  replied,  but  twisted  a  lip- 
grin  sardonic, 

Shunning  and  shunned  he  felt  the  discomfort 
before  the  whole  people; 

Possibly  too  he  avoided  all  part  in  the  praises 
of  Lincoln. 

Abe  and  Ab  with  their  names  fore-shortened 
were  busily  buzzing 

From  the  tongues  of  an  hundred  putting  a 
sting  in  their  contrast ; 

So  it  came  that  the  new-comer  soon  slipped 
away  from  the  meeting. 


Meanwhile  responded  to    Doctor   Palmetto 

pugnacious  Jack  Armstrong, 
Who  had  fought  in  the  Black  Hawk  War  as 

Orderly  Sargent, 
Hating  the  Indian  and  not  altogether  in  love 

with  the  Negro, 
Yet  disliking  black  slavery,  wishing  it  off  in 

the  distance, 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  249 

Out  of  the  State  where  he  lived,  but  it  trou- 
bled him  not  in  Kentucky — 

Strongly  affected  to  Lincoln  who  once  in  a 
wrestle  upset  him. 

Words  were  getting  too  choleric,  both  were 
shouting  together 

When  the  schoolmaster  rapped  with  his  fer- 
ule the  sash  of  the  window, 

Then  flung  open  the  door  of  the  schoclhouse 
and  bade  people  enter; 

All  rushed  in  like  a  flock  when  the  sheep 
spring  into  the  sheepfold 

After  the  bell-wether,  whose  little  tinkle  they 
hear  and  then  follow. 


"Let  this  meeting  be  opened — the  moment 
has  come  and  has  gone  too" — 

It  was  Mentor,  the  master,  who  picked  up 
the  word  that  awaited : 

"But  I  nowhere  can  see  the  orator  choice  of 
the  evening, 

Though  I  heard  Uncle  Jimmy  declare  he  was 
seen  in  the  distance 

For  a  single  short  glimpse,  and  then  vanished 
away  in  the  brushwood, 

Fleet  as  the  timorous  deer,  when  it  feels  it- 
self hit  by  man's  eye-shot. 

He  may  come  yet — but  debate  must  begin — 
has  already  begun  here." 


250  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

Meantime  the  people  had  noisily;  entered  and 

taken  their  places, 
Once  again  the  wise  Mentor  addressed  the 

now  seated  assembly: 
" Still  one  warning:  cool  be  the  argument, 

good  be  the  order, 
This  is  the  temple  of  light,  0  burn  it  not  up 

in  your  passion! 
You  can  destroy  it  by  wrath,  though  you  may 

not  fire  it  with  tinder; 
Be  it  the  shrine  of  sweet  peace  consecrated 

now  by  your  example. " 


So  exhorted  the  schoolmaster  uttering  saws 

of  sage  counsel 
Which  he  deeply  forefelt  the  chief  need  of 

the  present  occasion, 
For  in  his  heart  he  read  to  himself  quite  the 

same  sort  of  warning, 
His  own  soul  he  knew  as  the  scene  of  a  similar 

danger, 
What  he  saw  writ  in  his  bosom  he  spoke  as 

the  truth  to  his  people, 
Well  aware  that  the  Furies  and  Fates  in  the 

world  were  his  own  too, 
That  underneath  all  strife  with  its  death  lay 

the  soul's  resurrection. 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  251 

There  sit  the  folk  in  their  ranks  divided  al- 
most in  the  middle, 

Two  are  the  sides,  each  taking  their  seats  on 
the  opposite  benches, 

Facing  each  other  with  places  assigned  for 
the  leaders  contestant. 


Where  is  Lincoln?     Hardly  lie  knows  just 

where  he  himself  is, 
Wandering  lone  through  by-paths  he  turns 

from  the  way  to  the  schoolhouse, 
Dodging  now  into  the  moon-shade  to  keep 

himself  hidden  from  eye-sight. 
To  the  debate  had  stormed  up  within  him 

the  fiercest  repugnance, 
Far  too  dread  was  the  inside  debate  to  hold 

the  one  outside; 
Nor  could  he  summon  the  mood  for  telling 

the  people  a  story, 
Who  were  expecting  an  hour  arabesqued  with 

his  fancy  and  humor, 
As  he  wont  when  he  trod  in  the  village's 

treadmill  of  humdrum. 
But  he  was  living  a  story  far  deeper  than 

what  he  could  fable, 
For  he  had  heard  from  the  maid  that  Abner 

might  soon  be  expected, 
Yea  might  stroll  to  the  schoolhouse  into  his 

presence  this  evening, 


252  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RVTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

While  perchance  he  was  spinning  for  fun  a 

fiction  fantastic, 
Whereat  he  knew  that  every  fine  thread  of 

his  story  would  snap  off. 
Even  the  dream  of  seeing  the  rival  had  start- 
ed a  thrill  of  convulsion, 
To  whose  fit  he  was  chained  by  fate  in  a 

struggle  demonic, 
Which  he  could  never  escape,  and  of  which 

he  could  not  be  victor, 
Throbbing  his  day  and  his  night  in  the  throes 

of  a  torture  infernal. 
So  he  saunters   about,  lashed  forward  by 

love's  sweetest  longing, 
Yet  at  the  same  time  harried  with  hate's  un- 
earthly damnation; 
Love  of  the  one  is  fiendishly  coupled  with 

hate  of  the  other, 
Each  of  them  scourging  the  victim  in  turn 

with  rivalry  jealous, 
Till  of  a  sudden  he  stands  on  the  banks  where 

he  harkens  the  prattle 
Lipped  by  the  Sangamon's  tremulous  ripples 

along  its  low  stream-bed, 
Where  he  can  watch  the  luminous  dance  of 

the  silvery  minnows 
Leaping  up  sidelings  over  the  pebbles  to  kiss 

the  young  moonbeam 
Which  is  swooning  in  tender  caresses  upon 

the  lit  lap  of  the  landscape. 


253 

Still  that  scene  can  but  call  him  away  from 

himself  for  a  moment, 
Looking  around  he  beholds  high-perched  on 

its  hill-top  the  school-house, 
Now  illumed  through  the  windows  it  shines 

to  beckon  him  thither, 
But  he  can  not  respond,  still  choosing  the 

talk  of  the  waters, 

Though  it  be  wordless,  to  the  mad  clash  of  de- 
bate with  its  uproar, 
Eambling  until  he  stops  on  the  slope  and 

looks  down  at  the  mill-weir, 
Where  he  again  sees  himself  directing  the 

flight  of  his  flat-boat, 
Years  agone  when  once  it  had  lodged  on  the 

dam  in  the  river — 
Where  too  he  sees  a  fair  phantom  that  stood 

on  the  spot  where  he  now  stands, 
Who  throbbed  sympathy  down  to  him  just  at 

the  top  of  his  labor, 
Then  a  handkerchief  waved  as  in  triumph 

the  feat  was  accomplished. 
That  was  the  first  time  he  saw  her,  never 

again  of  him  unseen 
During  her  life  and  even  when  life  has  with 

her  evanished. 


Thus  he   reviews  his  happiest  moment  in 
tender  remembrance 


254  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

"Wafted    from    sorrow    to    joy,    from    joy 

whelmed  back  into  sorrow, 
Sighing  his  heart  out  as  he  went  creeping 

foot-sore,  fate-weary, 
Through  the  moon-shaded  nooks  fay-haunted 

of  valley  and  village ; 
All  New  Salem  had  turned  to  the  flit  of  a 

shadowy  specter, 
As  he  glanced  up  and  saw  the  faint  flicker 

of  light  from  the  school-house, 
Whence  he  thought  he  could  hear  the  shrill 

voice  of  some  passionate  speaker. 


Suddenly   feeling   turned   speech   when   he 

spoke  to  himself  as  his  other: 
"What  an  oppressive  presence!  a  fume  flows 

the  Sangamon  sultry, 
Where  all  seemed  on  a  time  upspringing  in 

buoyancy  youthful ! 
What  a  sweltering  world  weighs  on  me  and 

crushes  me  inward!" 
So  he  sat  down  on  a  stone  and  gazed  at  the 

Sangamon  star-gemmed, 
Which  then  appeared  to  run  through  his  soul 

as  it  flashed  on  his  eye-sight, 
Like  a  thread  which  threaded  his  life  with 

memories  tender 
Since  the  time  he  first  floated  its  current 

along  to  the  river, 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  255 

Which  thence  plunged  him  down  into  the 

frown  of  the  mad  Mississippi. 
Thus  the  Sangamon  small  grew  great  through 

Lincoln  who  henceforth 
Dwelt  not  far  from  its  hanks  as  it  wound 

through  his  days  till  his  sunset, 
Laving  the  land  not  far  from  his  tomb  still 

today  we  may  see  it. 


But  just  now  sad  Lincoln  broke  down  at  the 
view  of  the  waters. 

"I  must  leave  here  else  I  shall  fling  me  out 
into  yon  mill-dam, 

Memory  dear  in  the  past  has  become  my  de- 
spair in  the  present.** 

So  he  gave  a  quick  turn  and  shot  through 
an  alley  of  leafage 

From  the  sight  of  the  river  which  coiled 
through  his  soul  like  a  serpent, 

As  if  to  bear  it  away  from  his  body  off  into 
dark  Hades. 


But  as  he  townward  was  musing  he  saw  a 

lone  light  in  the  window 
At  the  home  of  the  Eutledges  fitfully  flicker 

in  pulses; 
Lincoln   stopped  in  his  tracks  and  gazed, 

foreboding  some  illness : 


256  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  Xll. 

11  Shall  I  go  to  inquire  and  offer  my  service 
if  needed?" 

So  he  balanced  both  sides  of  himself  sus- 
pending the  balance; 

Then  again  he  looked  up  and  marked  the 
weird  light  of  the  school-house, 

Which  like  a  Will-of-the-Wisp  kept  quiver- 
ing over  the  hill-top. 

There  he  stood  swaying  between  the  two 
flickers,  both  of  them  bodeful, 

Till  of  a  sudden  he  heard  from  the  school- 
house  booming  an  uproar, 

With  a  tap  of  the  bell,  one  tremulous  tap 
on  the  night  air — 

What  can  it  mean?  So  we  turn  back  our 
tale  to  probe  for  the  secret. 


Let  us  now  enter  the  little  red  round-house 

laughing  in  moonshine, 
Where  the  people  are  seated  with  lungs  full 

of  cheers  for  the  speakers, 
Somewhat  boisterous  yet  good  natured,  with 

jokes  of  the  backwoods 
Bandied  about  from  one  mouth  to  the  other 

in  many  a  guffaw; 
Each  of  the  sides  has  taken  its  seats,  quite 

equal  in  numbers, 
As  the  sage   schoolmaster  marshals  them 

in  to  the  stroke  of  his  ferule ; 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  £57 

Swelling  his  bosom  up  to  a  vociferous  pitch 

he  commands  them, 
So  that  above  all  the  noise  his>  voice  can  be 

heard  bidding  silence : 
"  Fellow-citizens,   hear  me    and   halt  for  a 

moment  your  tongue-spree, 
Squire  Ebenezer  I  move  we  make  chairman 

controlling  this  meeting, 
Balancer  fair  of  Justice  whenever  she  tilts 

on  the  pivot, 
With  authority's  mien  he  will  render  the 

rightful  decision. 
There  he  is !  look  for  yourselves  how  gravity 

sits  in  his  visage, 
Also   sits  in  his  belly  well  freighted  with 

many  good  dinners." 


Coarse  was  that  Humorous  punch  at  the 
Squire's  most  prominent  organ, 

But  the  Schoolmaster  even,  the  cultured,' 
classical  Mentor 

Never  could  quite  get  rid  of  the  straightfor- 
ward brogue  of  the  border. 

All  of  the  audience  roared  at  the  eloquent 
burst  of  the  speaker, 

Voting  a  thunderous  Aye  with  clapping  of 
hands  and  with  stamping. 


258  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  XII. 

But  there  was  one  who  refrained  from  the 
plaudits  and  even  from  voting, 

Doctor  Palmetto,  the  cutting  objector-in- 
chief  of  the  village; 

Still  his  No  he  out-spoke  not,  but  let  it  be 
told  in  his  action. 


Next  the  schoolmaster  gleefully  grappled  the 

Squire  by  the  forearm, 
Leading  him  up  with  a  laugh  to  the  platform 

of  honor,  thus  saying: 
"Here,  take  my  badge,  this  ferule,  which  to 

you  I  resign  now ; 
Yonder  suspended  the  gad  is,  which  you  may 

have  to  make  use  of, 
Trouncing  these  grown-up  children  to  order, 

as  I  do  their  young  ones; 
Nor  shall  I  seek  myself  to  exempt  from  what 

I've  inflicted,' 
You  may  be  forced  to  schoolmaster  here  the 

schoolmaster  also, 
Give  then  in  turn  his  own  medicine  to  him 

by  right  of  your  office, 
Show  him  new  proof  of  his  faith  in  the  law 

of  the  Fates  and  the  Furies." 


Merriment  ran  in  a  titter  around  the  full 
room,  while  the  Squire  shook 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  £59 

With  a  huge  laugh  that  bounced  up  and  down 

on  his  prominent  organ; 
Still  he  beat  on  the  desk  with  his  ferule, 

calling  for  order, 
In  the  lull  he  then  cried  out:  "What  is  the 

will  of  this  meeting?" 
Note  again  the  sage  schoolmaster,  rising  he 

reads  off  the  question: 
"  Which  one  has  suffered  more  wrong  from 

the  whites,  the  red  or  the  black  man ! ' ' 
This  from  a  paper  he  holds  in  his  hand,  and 

then  he  announces : 
"As  the  first  of  our  speakers  tonight  we 

had  chosen  James  Kutledge, 
He  with  his  dignified  calm  would  have  set 

us  the  worthy  example; 
But  he  has  to  be  absent,  detained  by  the  mal- 
ady sudden 
Which  has  seized  on  his  daughter ;  may  God 

save  her  life  for  our  blessing!" 
All  bowed  their  heads  and  silently  prayed 

in  response  the  same  prayer. 


Then  upsprang  for  a  speech  New  Salem 's 

old  fiery  fifer, 
Commonly  called  Tom  Cunes,  who  had  fought 

in  all  wars  with  the  Indian, 
Whom  he  hated  with  all  of  the  borderer 's 

hate  of  the  red  skin ; 


260  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

As  a  boy  he  had  fifed  for  Mad  Anthony 

Wayne  in  a  battle, 
Then  as  a  man  he  was  fifer  at  Tippecanoe, 

but  he  shot  too; 
Fighting  he  fifed  in  the  furious  fight  at  the 

death  of  Tecumseh, 
Which  every  day  with  his  tongue  he  fought 

over  again  in  New  Salem. 
Lastly  through  his  gray  mustache  for  Lin- 
coln he  fifed  against  Black  Hawk. 
Numerous  wars  of  his  own  he  had  waged 

by  himself  on  the  border 
With  the  red  devils — so  he  would  grace  them 

— giving  and  taking; 
Scars  he  abounded  in — one  of  a  tomahawk 

over  his  cheek-bone, 
While  on  his  scalp  he  would  show  the  grim 

gash  of  an  Indian's  knife-blade. 


All  these  exploits  he  now  ran  on  recounting, 

with  more  still  to  draw  from, 
Telling  of  Daniel  Boone  whom  he  met  once 

up  in  Missouri, 
Telling  of  how  he  outwitted  the  red-skins 

when  taken  their  captive, 
How  he  escaped  from  the   stake  with  the 

faggots  lighted  around  him: 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  261 

Down  fell  the  ferule  on  time  in  the  hands 

of  the  strict  Ebenezer, 
Who  had  tallied  the  minutes  upon  the  Dutch 

clock  in  the  corner, 
When  old  Tom  cried  out:  "I  hav'nt  yet  told 

of  Notoka, 
Sweet  Indian  girl  who  loved  me,  the  white 

boy,  and  kissed  me." 


But  said  the  chairman :  ' '  Hundreds  of  times 

we  have  heard  that  already, 
On  the  streets  you  have  told  the  story  for 

years  in  New  Salem: 
Tom,  that  girl  was  the  only  red  face  you  ever 

bowed  down  to, 
Well  you  know  that  white  Barbara  who  is 

the  wife  of  your  bosom 
Always  has  vetoed  your  telling  that  tale  of 

red  love  in  her  presence, 
Hating  the  Indian  girl  as  much  as  you  hated 

the  parent. 
Barbara  here  we  shall  follow,  so  we  now  call 

for  the  next  one, 
Abraham  Lincoln — not  yet  arrived — what  is 

it  that  keeps  him — 
Who  was  to  shine  the  bright  oratorical  star 

of  the  evening 
And  to  spin  us  his  yarn  of  the  deeds  in  the 

halls  of  Vandalia?" 


262  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

Then  the  tongue-quick  Mentor  at  once  by 
the  people  was  chosen 

As  the  next  spokesman,  to  tell  of  the  wrongs 
by  us  done  to  the  negro; 

Not  unfit  was  the  choice,  though  regarded  by 
some  with  suspicion, 

For  he  was  thought  to  favor  at  heart  aboli- 
tion of  slavery. 


Off  he  started  his  speech  with  the  start  of 

that  African  cargo 
Which  first  landed  the  blacks  long  ago  on 

the  shores  of  Virginia, 
Tracing  the  history  up  to  the  Compromise 

named  from  Missouri, 
Which  he  declared  the  Devil's  infliction  of 

Hell  on  our  country. 
But  behold  the  division   halving   the    little 

round  school-house! 

Hark  the  one  half  applauding,  the  other  dis- 
senting in  murmurs ! 
Still  the  chairman  kept  rapping  with  strokes 

of  his  ferule  for  order, 
While  he  turned  to  the  schoolmaster  monish- 

ing  looks  to  be  careful; 
Thus  the  deep  split  of  the  time  was  revealed 

in  the  town  of  New  Salem, 
Which  gave  presage  of  what  was  to  come  in 

the  State  and  the  Nation. 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  £63 

All  were  agreed  on  expelling  the  Indian,  the 

savage  ungodly, 
But  the  African  stirred  up  a  far  deeper  strife 

with  his  problem. 
Only  one  man  in  a  whisper  spoke  sympathy 

with  the  wild  red-skin, 
Blaming  the  theft  of  his  lands  and  lamenting 

his  race's  destruction; 
But  the  low  speaker  was  drowned  in   the 

hubbub  over  the  darkey, 
Who  was  not  owner  of  land,  not  owner  he 

was  of  himself  even. 
But  the  tempest  grew  calm  at  last  to  the 

voice  of  the  chairman, 
Who  with  a  vigorous  smile  turned  his  look 

on  the  speaker,  thus  saying: 
''Mentor,  beware — the  schoolmaster  present 

am  I — so  remember ; 
See  yon  gad  on  the  wall — and  mark  too  the 

play  of  this  ferule- 
On  your  own  skin  may  be  written  the  judg- 
ment of  Fates  and  of  Furies." 


Coolly  the  orator  started,  but  quickly  waxed 

hot  in  his  fervor 
As  he  uttered  his  prophecy  glimpsing  that 

day  in  the  future 
When  the  black  slave  would  forever  be  freed 

by  some  great  liberation. 


264  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  X1L 

Then  the  hurrahs  broke  from  this  side,  and 
hooting  and  howling  from  yonder, 

While  the  fused  schoolmaster  rose  more  fer- 
vid and  daring  than  ever, 

Standing  his  ground  till  he  faced  down  the 
tumult  with  help  of  the  chairman. 

Then  he  reared  up  on  tiptoe  and  screamed 
at  the  top  of  his  windpipe : 

"You,  New  Salem,  forget  not  how  you  the 
lecturer  hounded, 

How  you  once  smothered  free  speech — you 
now  are  trying  to  stab  it — 

You  must  pay  for  that  deed  yet,  its  guilt 
you  will  have  to  atone  for — 

You  set  fire  to  free  print  in  those  pamphlets, 
you  too  will  be  burning." 


Fiercer  than  ever  broke  loose  the  storm  at 

such  doom  of  the  village, 
Even  the  chairman  smote  down  on  the  desk 

with  his  ferule  reproving 
Mutinous  words  of  the  schoolmaster  naughty 

whose  seat  he  was  filling. 
Each  of  the  sides  sprang  up  on  the  small 

amphitheater 's  benches, 
Facing  each  other,  some  shaking  their  fists 

and  shouting  reproaches; 
Keenly    the    nerve    of    the    time  had  been 

pricked  with  the  tip  of  the  needle — 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII.    265 

That  sharp  tip  of  the  schoolmaster's  tongue 
with  its  poisonous  word-sting 

"Which  had  hit  to  the  heart  with  the  threat 
of  retributive  Furies. 


Forward  into  the  center  sprang  Doctor  Pal- 
metto the  wrathful, 

Who  had  led  the  mad  mob  which  once  burnt 
up  the  lecturer's  pamphlets, 

Shouting  white-hot  at  the  speaker:  "You  are 
the  worst  mollycoddle!" 

Nobody  knew  just  what  the  word  meant,  it 
was  new  in  New  Salem, 

But  all  thought  it  must  mean  something  ter- 
rible, sounding  so  fiercely; 

One  man  thundered:  "That  is  some  more 
of  your  devilish  Latin, 

But  you  shall  not  scare  us  any  longer  talk- 
ing your  ghost-talk." 

So  Jack  Armstrong,  the  athletic  twister  of 
men  for  that  township, 

Friend  of  Schoolmaster  Graham  and  also  of 
Lawmaker  Lincoln, 

Sprang  forth  into  the  buzzing  arena,  coat 
off  for  the  battle, 

For  the  Armstrong  name  he  would  justify 
always  by  muscle ; 

Much  he  disliked  the  Doctor's  big  words, 
though  he  knew  not  their  meaning, 


266    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

So  he  flung  out  the  epithet  which  would  open 

the  sluices: 
"You  are  a  liar!"  he  cried  at  the  top  of  the 

boisterous  tumult. 


Meanwhile  also  the  Squire  had  hurried  down 

into  the  middle, 
Loudly  commanding  peace  in  the  name  of 

the  law  and  his  office, 
Standing  between  the  two  combatants  who 

had  stopped  at  his  order, 
When  a  sharp  knock  is  heard  at  the  door — 

behold  James  Rutledge, 
Who  in  a  pallor  beseeches  the  doctor  to  go 

to  his  dwelling 
With  all  haste,  for  his  daughter  has  suddenly 

sunk  in  a  fever. 
"Speed  to  your  duty!"  the  Squire  thus  bade 

the  belligerent  Doctor, 
Leading  him  through  to  the  doorstep  whence 

with  the  anxious  father 
He   shot  off  in  the   dark,   still  menacing: 

"This  is  not  ended." 


Mark  now  the  schoolmaster,  how  he  has 
weaponed  himself  for  the  warfare, 

That  long  poker  he  grasps  in  one  hand  with 
a  look  of  defiance, 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  267 

In  the  other  he  clutches  the  inkstand  of  lead 
as  a  bullet, 

Both  he  had  hid  out  of  sight  to  keep  them 
from  passionate  fighters; 

But  the  Squire  pushed  up  and  quickly  dis- 
armed him,  repeating, 

"Now  I  am  forced  to  schoolmaster  here  the 
schoolmaster  also 

On  his  own  self  to  example  his  faith  in  the 
Fates  and  the  Furies." 

Even  the  gad  he  took  down  from  the  wall 
and  shook  it  at  Mentor, 

Whereat  his  rounded  abdomen  fell  into  a 
stormy  convulsion 

In  response  to  his  features  brimimng  all  over 
with  laughter. 

Soon  the  people  too  caught  it,  at  first  in 
circuits  of  giggles, 

Till  the  whole  mass  breaks  forth,  both  sides 
exploding  together 

Into  a  common  outburst  of  merriment  at  the 
two  actors; 

So  in  a  laugh  the  strife  of  the  time  is  solved 
at  New  Salem, 

But  not  forever,  perchance;   still  hearken, 
ye  laughers,  a  moment: 

"Now  I  adjourn  this  meeting  just  at  its  hap- 
piest temper," 

Said  the  chairman  in  glee  and  faced  his  audi- 
ence homewards ; 


268   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLED'GE.—BOOK  XII. 

But  as  the  crowd  was  leaving  the  house  he 

snuffed  out  the  candles, 
Using  his  fingers  as  snuffers  and  throwing 

the  snuff  in  the  wood-box. 
Then  as  he  groped  in  the  dark,  he  by  acci- 
dent clutched  on  the  bell-rope, 
Giving  a  whirl  to  the  bell  which  sounded 

one  toll  o  'er  the  village 
With  a  shiver  of  echoes  knelling  afar  in  the 

night-spell. 
All  the  people  heard  it  and  turned  their 

laugh  to  a  tremor, 
As  they  remembered  the  mystery  shot  in 

the  skies  at  their  village ; 
And  the  schoolmaster    heard    it,    trudging 

along  to  his  quarters, 
Quivering  still  with  the  throes  of  the  words 

he  dared  speak  in  the  meeting, 
Words  of  bold  prophecy  uttering  penalty  on 

the  wrong-doer, 
But  his  chief  marvel  was  over  the  ominous 

absence  of  Lincoln. 


Where  is  Lincoln?     Hardly  he  knows  just 

where  he  himself  is, 
Still  in  a  stray,  as  if  seeking  his  own  lost 

soul  to  recover; 
In  his  revery  slowly  he  strides  through  a  field 

to  the  roadway, 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  269 

Which  again  leads  by  the  mansion  of  Lady 

Eulalia  Lovelace, 

Of  whose  courteous  friendship  rise  reminis- 
cences gentle. 
But  he  noticed  the  hedge  was  uncropped  and 

the  yard  was  uncared  for, 
Even  the  well-known  gate  stood  unhinged 

and  was  hanging  half  open. 
What  could  it  mean — such  neglect — and  in 

her — the  pink  of  all  neatness? 
Every  fence-corner  showed  a  new  revel  of 

weeds  in  their  freedom. 
Had  the  soul  of  that  beautiful  woman  quit 

also  its  mansion? 
Musing  that  only  his  mood  may  mirror  the 

night's  melancholy, 
Glides  he  along  in  the  dark  underneath  the 

still  mulberry's  branches, 
Where  he  recalls  the  sweet  scenes  of  the  one 

afternoon  of  love's  life-work, 
Just  a  few  hours  old,  still  mightily  storming 

in  heart-throbs. 


But  of  a  sudden  he  thinks  with  a  clash  oi  his 

breath  the  new  meaning 
Which  now  thrills  in  his  brain  from  the  last 

tearful  gleam  of  Ann  Eutledge, 
As  at  her  parting  she  looked  up,  and  sobbed 

out  the  pain  of  her  soul's  wound, 


270  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

Fervently  asking  of  Heaven  if  this  be  her 

second  betrothal, 
And  in  a  prayer  appealing  to  God  to  come  to 

her  rescue. 
Then  as  she  spoke  she  revealed  her  agony 

tearing  her  features, 
For  she  thought  of  her  promise  of  love  as 

now  double  in  conflict, 
Which  gave  a  stab  to  h«r  soul  and  cut  it  in 

twain  to  the  bottom; 
Still  each  half  of  herself  seemed  smiting  in 

frenzy  the  other. 
Now  he  remembered  how  she  had  dropped 

to  her  seat  in  a  pallor, 
Though  she  valiantly    rallied  and  set     out 

alone  for  her  dwelling. 
Lincoln  repeated  her  agony  all  of  a  sudden 

within  him, 
When  it  fully  came  over  him  what  she  had 

felt  in  her  anguish, 
For  the  same  struggle  had  made  him  her 

counterpart  throbbing  its  torment. 


So  he  arose  in  a  pang  to  follow  her  path  to 

her  homestead, 
Till  he  came  to  the  spot  where  flashed  the 

two  flickering  light-points 
Into  his   auguring  eye  through  the   night 

from  two  opposite  quarters, 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  271 

Yet  to  his  mood  both  spoke  in  a  similar  lan- 
guage of  portent. 

Listen!  what  is  that  sound  which  he  hears 
from  the  little  red  school-house? 

Voices  commingled  and  pitched  in  a  scream 
too  loud  for  one  speaker! 

Bodes  he:  "Well  do  I  know  a  fought  com- 
bat might  lurk  in  that  question; 

Can  it  be  that  some  hothead  has  flung  in  the 
meeting  his  fire-brand? 

Has  the  irascible  Doctor  perchance  been 
starting  a  tumult? 

Heavens !  I  may  be  needed !  How  can  I  drive 
myself  thither ! ' ' 


But  of  a  sudden  the  light  goes  out,  and  dark 

are  the  windows. 
Lincoln,  hid  in  the  moon-shade  cast  by  the 

boughs  of  kind  beeches, 
Silently  watches  the  people  stream  homeward 

away  from  the  school-house, 
Till  suave  silence  is  lord  of  the  night,  and 

abed  is  the  village. 

Slowly  he  strides  to  the  Public  Square  pain- 
fully brooding    ' 
On  the  twin  agonies,  that  of  himself  and  that 

of  the  maiden, 
Each  of  which  doubles  anew  with  a  cut  both 

inward  and  outward, — 


272  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

Look  at  it  there !  a  brief  flicker  darts  out  of 

the  school-house's  window, 
Then  it  ceases  and  leaves  the  whole  hill-top 

in  slumberous  darkness: 
"Only  my  fantasy  gleams  thus,  illuming  the 

phantoms  of  night's  swoon — 
Still  I  behold  the  faint  light  but  steady  from 

Eutledge's  window." 


So  his  two  selves  keep  quizzing  each  other, 
affirming,  denying. 

Mooded  in  gloom's  premonition  of  fate  he 
paces  his  pathway, 

When  he  looks  up  once  more  to  contemplate 
the  heaven-tipped  belfry. 

See  again  the  fleet  flashes  mysterious  over 
the  windows, 

Tongues  of  flame  that  seem  hissed  from  the 
mouth  of  a  fire-breathing  dragon, 

Then  with  a  flare  they  lap  back  to  the  dark- 
ness inwalled  of  the  school-house. 

"Not  my  own  eye,"  he  reflected,  "has  feigned 
that  luminous  phantom." 

So  he  resolves  to  slip  up  the  hillside  and 
probe  for  the  secret 

Which  had  touched  far  down  to  a  chord  un- 
der-grown in  his  nature, 

Weirdly  connecting  his  life  with  some  doom 
of  destiny  coming. 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  £73 

But  just  when  he  would  take  the  first  step,  the 
creak  of  a  door-hinge 

Over  the  Public  Square  with  a  music  uncanny 
fell  grating ! 

Thence  he  beheld  two  men  stride  forward  and 
stand  on  the  pavement 

Talking  earnestly,  face  to  face,  a  few  mo- 
ments together, 

One  with  his  hat  on  bowed  to  the  other  whose 
head  was  uncovered, 

Speaking  his  farewell  words  so  loud  that  Lin- 
coln could  hear  them: 

' '  Friend,  tomorrow  again  I  shall  come  at  the 
turn  of  her  illness." 

That  was  the  Doctor  addressing  Ann  Eut- 
ledge's  sore-troubled  father, 

Who  hurried  back  to  the  house,  while  the  Doc- 
tor trudged  drearily  onward. 


Now  the  big  ball  of  the  moon  has  rolled  down 

the  dome  of  high  heaven, 
Sliding  beneath  the  horizon  and  turning  to 

night  the  lit  landscape, 
Whose  dark  folds  from  one  bluff  to  the  other 

have  filled  up  the  valley, 
Under  whose  cover  the  Sangamon  grumbles 

invisible  murmurs. 


274  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XII. 

When  lie  heard  the  dire  words  of  the  Doctor, 

Lincoln  fell  shot  through 
With  a  thunderbolt  barbed  of  anguish,  and 

lay  in  the  star-shade 
Cast  by  a  maple  upon  whose  tortuous  roots 

he  coiled  up  in  convulsion. 
There  he  lapsed  to  a  somnolent  swoon,  half 

awake,  half  dreaming, 
When  he  visioned  an  endless  procession  of 

years  winding  onward, 
Bearing  their  hero  they  mournfully  trod  in 

a  line  down  to  doomsday ; 
Oft  he  essayed  to  snatch  a  sly  peep  at  the 

face  of  their  God-born, 
Whom  the  years,  though  mortal  themselves, 

keep  ever  immortal, 
Till  that  youth  caught  a  glimpse  of  an  old 

wrinkled  cheek  in  the  coffin, 
Then  he  recognized  fully  the  lines  in  those 

deep-furrowed  features, 
Talking  aloud  in  his  dream:    "I  know  ye — 

I  am  myself  this." 


Fire!  Fire!  pierced  a  shrill  shout  with  its  ter- 
ror the  sleep  of  the  village. 

Lincoln  awoke  and  sprang  to  his  feet  in  the 
might  of  his  startle, 

Suddenly  saw  he  a  blaze  leap  out  of  the  roof 
of  the  school-house 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  275 

And  illumine  the  hill-top  with  flashes  on  trees 
and  on  houses. 

Fire!  Fire!  thrilled  the  shout  of  the  people 
producing  a  shiver, 

As  each  bore  on  a  run  to  the  scene  the  house- 
hold's big  bucket, 

And  a  woman  came  rushing  half-dressed  with 
her  kitchen's  clothes-boiler; 

Soon  one  ladder  was  brought  which  reached 
to  the  eaves  of  the  building, 

Up  whose  rungs  were  soon  handed  the  slop- 
ping pailfuls  of  water. 


Fire!  Fire!  But  hark !  the  bell  begins  clanging 
— the  swift-clapping  fire-bell! 

Deed  of  the  schoolmaster  bursting  the  door  in 
and  clutching  the  bell-rope 

For  his  last  ring  which  tolls  now  the  funeral 
pyre  of  the  school-house. 

See  too  the  belfry  in  flames  which  lap  up  a 
cone  of  fleet  fire-tongues ! 

Down  rolls  the  bell  on  the  roof  and  fitfully 
rings  its  own  death-knell, 

Till  it  smites  on  the  ground  and  breaks  into 
pieces  still  chiming 

As  they  fall,  at  the  feet  of  the  villagers  listen- 
ing sadly. 


276  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  XII. 

Lincoln  now  hastened  to  help  with  the  rest, 
but  all  to  no  purpose ; 

Still  as  he  passes  the  store,  he  sees  Abner 
saving  his  own  first, 

Who  on  his  roof  with  bucket  and  broom  runs 
fighting  the  sparkles. 

So  the  village's  center  of  light  has  illumed 
its  last  lesson, 

Now  it  spells  but  a  heap  of  hot  cinders  droop- 
ing to  ashes. 


Lincoln  surprises  them  all  as  he  slips  to  a 

group  of  his  friends  there, 
Darkly  discussing  the  problem:  What  could 

have  started  the  blazes? 
Accident  be  it — or  purpose?    Whom  can  we 

blame  for  disaster  ?" 
" Strange,"  says  Lincoln,  "Twice  there  fell 

in  mine  eye  from  a  distance 
Fiery  flashes  lolling  their  tongues  in  wrath 

for  a  moment 
Out  of  this  schoolhouse  when  the  night's  noon 

already  was  nearing ; 
I  had  started  to  search,  but  the  flickers  would 

die  out  in  darkness, 
So  I  dismissed  them   as    only   the   foolery 

flashed  by  my  fancy, 
Or  as  the  shimmering  glint  of  the  moonshine 

glanced  from  the  windows. 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  277 

Probably  mine  was  the  sole  eye  awake  in  this 

town — but  I  went  not." 
Then  interrupting  him  sighfully  spake  the 

schoolmaster  Mentor : 
"When  the  door  I  broke  open  I  noticed  just 

where  the  tinder  had  started, 
Still  was  blazing  the  wood-box  where  we 

would  throw  the  old  paper. 
But  I  cannot  conceive  for  me  how  or  why  it 

should  kin  die." 


Here  of  a  sudden  the  schoolmaster's  speech 
and  his  sobs  too  have  halted, 

For  there  rose  on  his  soul  his  faith  in  the 
Fates  and  the  Furies — 

Furies  retributive,  ever  returning  the  deed 
unto  mankind. 

And  he  recalled  the  swift  words  of  his  proph- 
ecy lurid  that  evening, 

Judging  the  Powers  would  balance  the  burn- 
ing of  print  with  a  burning. 


Doctor  Palmetto  "was  present  and  gazed  at 

the  wrath  of  the  blazes, 
Gratified  grimly  to  see  the  fulfillment  of  what 

he  predicted, 
While  on  the  spot  he  delighted  to  utter  his 

dark  diagnosis: 


278  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BQOE  XII. 

''This  is  also  a  symptom,  I  hold,  of  the  time 

so  deeply  diseased ; 
Everywhere  I  discover  this  fever  in  man  and 

the  world  too, 
For  it  is  racking  not  merely  this  town,  but 

this  State  and  this  Nation. 
Now  like  a  plague  it  is  seizing  the  innocent 

maid  in  her  flower, 
Bringing  the  malady  speedy  to  whelm  her 

down  under  her  grave-stone." 
Further  he  spake  not,  but  all  thought  of  his 

beautiful  patient, 
As  they  breathed  a  still  prayer,  heart-heaved 

for  her  quick  restoration. 
Lincoln  slid  into  a  shadow  to  throw  down  a 

tear  in  his  sorrow. 


Note  too  a  man  who  now  slips  from  the  group 
and  plods  his  path  homeward, 

Not  a  word  of  parting  he  speaks,  not  a  word 
on  the  fire  he  utters, 

For  he  reproaches  himself  as  the  cause  of  this 
naming  destruction, 

Simply  recalling  in  dole  his  last  deed  of  snuff- 
ing the  candle — 

That  was  Squire  Ebenezer  who  had  once 
builded  the  structure, 

Chosen  its  circular  shape  and  selected  its  site 
on  the  hill-top, 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  279 

Far  overlooking  the  land  round  about  as  a 

presence  inspiring. 
Chance  had  made  him  destroyer  of  what  of 

his  own  he  held  dearest, 
In  his  silence  he  seemed  to  be  hearing  the 

voice  of  a  judgment. 
Slowly  pacing  his  way  he  would  ponder  r 

'  *  Here  I  cannot  rebuild  it — 
Done  is  its  work — so  is  mine,  perchance,  too — 

No,  I  swear  never ! 
This  dead  school-house  I  yet  shall  restore  to 

a  young  resurrection." 


Mournfully  all  the  citizens  glanced  at  the 
smouldering  ash-heap, 

Now  but  the  emptied  skull  where  housed  once 
the  mind  of  the  village ; 

Soon  they  turned  from  the  sight  of  their  sor- 
row and  sped  to  their  door-sills, 

Each  man  trying  in  vain  to  peer  through  the 
mystery's  darkness, 

Yet  weighed  down  with  a  feeling  forebodeful 
of  doom  in  his  spirit, 

Whispering:  "This  is  the  judgment  which 
sent  as  its  signal  the  fire-ball. ' ' 


Last  of  the  people  to  leave  are  two  persons, 
diverse  yet  concordant: 


280  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE.—BOOK  XII. 

[William  the  wainwriglit  and  Mentor  the  peda- 
gogue stray  off  together ; 

In  a  meandering  silence  they  flit  through  the 
star-gloam  like  specters, 

Till  the  sorrowful  schoolmaster  dooming 
breaks  out  in  a  heart-burst : 

" Deepest  of  all  is  my  loss — my  vocation  lies 
dead  in  those  ruins — 

O  my  life !  it  seems  gone !  I  feel  it  has  ended 
in  nothing — 

Bounded  itself  to  a  zero  with  many  a  flourish 
and  flounder. ' ' 


"Nay,"  says  William  the  wainwright,  who 
speaks  from  the  center  of  cosmos : 

"Spark  of  the  Master  eternal,  the  light  on 
this  hill-top  you  kindled 

Shall  not  go  out  while  the  world  in  its  whirl 
keeps  circling  its  orbit ; 

More  immortal  it  is  than  the  Sun  which  also 
shall  burn  out. 

I  and  each  of  your  pupils  must  die  in  our  time 
like  this  school-house, 

Still  what  you  have  helped  make  us  endureth 
through  all  generations, 

And  if  not  here,  then  elsewhere  you  will  up- 
build the  new  school-house. 


THE  DOUBLE  DEBATE  281 

Friend,  remember  that  word  on  the  bell  which 

hung  in  the  belfry — 
Motto  of  Hope  undying  you  wrote  there — 

Now  live  it — Eesurgam." 


icmk 


The  Passing  of  Ann  Rutledge. 

"  Doubtful  the  case  is— not  bodily  ailment  so 

much  as  mental; 
Medicine  goes  not  home  to  the  point  of  the 

malady's  fury, 
But  is  rejected  with  Nature's  disdain  of  a 

meddling  intruder." 

So  said  the  Doctor  turning  away  from  the 

bed  of  his  patient, 
And  addressing  a  word  in  low  tones  to  her 

father  James  Rutledge, 
Whose  eye  sphering  a  tear  gave  sign  of  his 

strong  self-suppression. 
"Only  the  Doctor  in  Heaven  can  help  her, 

my  art  is  now  useless." 
(282) 


THE  PASSING  OF  ANN  RUTLEDGE.         283 

And  as  he  spoke  tEe  physician  made  ready 
'to  pass  from  the  sick-room, 

But  at  the  door  he  laid  on  the  hand  of  the 
father  a  notelet, 

Then  he  started  away  to  visit  some  easier  ill- 
ness. 

Still  once  more  he  turned  round  and  spoke 
the  parting  injunction : 

"Let  her  mind  have  its  way  now,  there  is  no 
good  in  refusal. 

I  shall  come  no  more,  I  think  she  is  better 
without  me." 

For  the  Doctor  observed  how  his  patient 
averted  her  eye-balls 

When  beside  her  he  sat  and  felt  of  her  wrist 
at  the  blood-pulse. 


As  he  stepped  forth  from  the  door  of  the 

house,  he  saw  in  the  distance 
Pensively  pacing  his  path  the  tall  figure  of 

Abraham  Lincoln, 
Who  oft  glanced  at  the  dwelling  where  lay 

the  suffering  maiden ; 
But  the  two  men  turned  aside  as  if  shying 

from  each  other's  presence. 


So  Ann  Eutledge  was  slowly  approaching  the 
goal  of  her  conflict, 


284    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  Zlll. 

Which  was  cleaving  her  soul  and  had  made 

her  life  a  long  battle ; 
Every  breath  she  could  draw  was  renewing 

the  fateful  encounter. 
As  she  lay  in  her  bed,  she  would  look  at  the 

ring  of  betrothal, 
Throbs  of  deep  anguish  would  flush  on  her 

face  her  innermost  struggle, 
While  she  would  tug  at  the  stubborn  red 

pledge  to  free  herself  of  it; 
But  let  her  wrench  and  twist  as  she  might, 

she  could  not  remove  it, 
And   the   wrestle   without   but   echoed   the 

wrestle  within  her. 


Over  the  father  who  watched  her  with  sym- 
pathy ran  the  same  surges, 

Till  he  felt  the  tense  throes  of  her  sorrow 
inside  his  own  bosom, 

And  he  cried  out  anguished  in  heart  yet  gen- 
tle in  accent: 

"Let  me  file  from  your  finger  that  ring  which 
so  worries  your  illness — 

Somehow  it  seems  the  one  center  of  all  of 
your  suffering,  daughter." 

' '  No,  no ! ' '  pitching  her  voice  to  a  scream  she 
would  speak  in  her  struggle : 

"That  I  well  might  have  done  for  myself 
long  since,  but  I  could  not. 


THE  PASSING  OF  ANN  RVTLEDQE.         285 

It  must  remain  where  once  it  was  put  till  it 
roll  off  in  freedom, 

Or  perchance  till  it  let  me  remove  it  just  by 
my  own  power." 

Then  her  voice  would  tone  down  her  speech 
to  a  happier  cadence : 

"Let  me  die  here  on  this  earth  still  true  to 
its  law  and  my  promise, 

But  obeying  my  love  I  must  go  to  the  Pres- 
ence supernal! 

Ah !  two  duties  I  feel  in  my  soul,  fiercely  war- 
ring each  other, 

Duty  terrestrial,  duty  celestial  belong  not  to- 
gether, 

Yet  they  both  are  nestled  within  me,  clinching 
my  heart-strings. 

Here  below  is  nothing  but  strife  for  my  days, 
myself  am  asunder, 

Mortal  I  feel  in  this  frame,  but  my  Love,  I 
know,  is  immortal. 

May  I  perish  of  Love  for  the  one,  which  was 
promised  another: 

Let  me  be  whole  in  my  God  Who  is  Love, 
Creator  of  all  things ! ' ' 


So  she  spake  in  the  might  of  her  faith  as  she 

rose  on  her  elbow, 
But  she  soon  fell  back  on  her  pillow  and 

seemed  to  be  thinking: 


286    LINCOLN  £ND  ANN  RUTLEDOE—BOOK  XIIL 

"Two  commands  I  can  hear — two  laws — yet 

throttling  each  other — 
I  can  feel  their  tumultuous  wrestle  in  every 

blood-drop. 
Go  I  must  now  to  where  they  are  one,  in  One 

Being  eternal." 
For  a  moment  she  calmed,  then  wrenched  in 

a  fiercer  convulsion : 
"Two  betrothals  are  mine,  and  slaying  each 

other  they  slay  me, 

Driving  my  love  off  the  earth  to  win  its  eter- 
nal fulfillment ; 
Here  below  is  the  judgment,  above  is  the  song 

of  salvation, 
Here  Love  grapples  with  Death,  but  there  it 

rises  transfigured." 
Then  she  sank  into  silence  as  if  too  deeply 

reflecting 
For  the  power  of  words  to  utter  the  stretch 

of  her  spirit. 


Slowlier  drooped  to  a  dreamful  relapse  her 

quivering  eyelids, 
That  she  might  widen  her  inward  vision  to 

regions  beyond  her ; 
Still  she  bespoke  her  burden  of  heart  while 

keeping  her  glance  shut : 


THE  PASSING  OF  ANN  RUTLEDGE.         287 

"I  cannot  live  where  Conscience  and  Love  di- 
vide me  in  conflict, 

What  I  ought  not  I  must — and  yet  what  I 
ought  I  must  not ; 

Conscience  is  stabbing  my  heart,  yet  my  heart 
is  sapping  my  Conscience ; 

Placate  my  love  of  the  law  and  the  law  of  my 
love  I  cannot. 

Love  the  one  here  I  dare  not,  but  I  dare  love 
him  in  Heaven. 

God  of  my  Hope  that  is  deathless,  take  me  up 
into  Thy  bosom !" 


Thus  in  her  temple  of  prayer  she  seemed  to 

be  holding  her  service 
Over  herself  that  her  soul  might  be  ready  to 

speed  its  last  journey, 
When  her  father  addressed  her,  seeking  to 

bring  her  some  comfort: 
"Here  is  a  message  in  writing  put  into  my 

hand  by  the  Doctor: 

From  your  betrothed  it  was  sent — he  is  com- 
ing to  pay  you  a  visit." 
Then  Ann  Eutledge  opened  her  eyes  once 

more  and  sat  up, 
Voicing  her  wishes  in  words  new-born  of  her 

heart's  aspiration: 


288     LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RVTLEDGE.—BOOK  XIII. 

"Will  he  restore  me  my  promise  whose  bond 

has  made  me  so  hapless? 
Will  he  release  me  from  law  that  before  God 

I  be  guiltless? 
He  must  say  I  am  free  and  take  back  this 

ring  of  betrothal — 
That  I  be  one  in  myself  here,  and  one  up  in 

Heaven  above  me.'* 
Even  she  raises  her  arm  as  she  stresses  her 

words  with  a  gesture : 

'  *  Live  I  cannot,  fulfilling  a  life  of  a  limp  love- 
less duty, 
Others  may  do  so — both  the  man  and  the 

woman — I  shall  not; 
Rather,  0  let  me  die  with  the  hope  of  my  love 

in  the  future." 


Then  she  held  out  her  ring-finger  hand  as  if 

making  confession 
To  an  invisible  Power  which  touched  her  with 

sudden  renewal, 
For  she  straightened  her  body  once  more  in 

the  stretch  of  her  vigor. 
But  her  father  could  only  reply  in  sympathy's 

sorrow : 
"He  will  be  coming  today  to  claim  thee  as 

bride  by  thy  promise." 


THE  PASSING  OF  ANN  RVTLEDGE.         289 

Slowly  she  wilted  to  weakness  again  and  sank 

on  her  pillow, 
As  she  spake  to  her  father  intoning  despair 

in  the  echo: 
' '  Send  for  Lincoln  at  once  to  soothe  me  amid 

my  last  soul-pain; 
I  would  look  on  his  love  here  again  before 

I  am  lookless, 
Vowing  anew  my  single  betrothal  to  him — 

him  only." 


Over  the  Public  Square  across  from  the  home 

of  Ann  Rutledge, 
Lincoln  sadly  had  sauntered  and  stood  there 

wistfully  gazing, 
Drawn  by  that  consonant  chord  which  brings 

two  people  together, 
Who,  though  remote  in  space,  quaff  the  same 

deep  fountain  of  spirit, 
Whose  tuned  feelings  of  oneness  appear  to 

throw  throbs  through  the  distance, 
Quite  unconscious  to  both,  who  impart  to 

each  other  their  presence, 
That  not  only  they  feel  but  obey  their  mutual 

devotion, 
Till  they  utter  the  passionate  word  in  love's 

consecration. 


290   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  Xlll. 

!When  the  father  had  beckoned  him  thither- 
ward, Lincoln  was  ready ; 

Stepping  quickly  along,  he  but  followed  the 
pull  of  his  being, 

Till  he  had  passed  through  the  door  and 
softly  had  slipped  to  the  sick-room 

Which  heretofore  was  forbidden  his  presence 
by  word  of  the  Doctor, 

Under  the  medical  plea  of  the  patient's  dan- 
gerous illness. 


But  now  the  lovers  were  left  all  alone  for  the 
interview  final; 

Even  the  father  withdrew  in  right  of  a  bond 
that  was  deeper 

Than  a  parent's  affection,  and  Lincoln  sat 
down  by  the  bedside. 

Sainted    in    look    already,    Ann    Eutledge 
reached  to  her  bosom, 

Thence  she  drew  forth  the  torn  letter  of  Lin- 
coln's former  renouncement, 

Torn  in  twain  to  the  edge  through  the  ink- 
red  heart  on  the  cover, 

Sacredly  kept  the  while  by  the  maiden  and 
secretly  looked  at, 

For  it  would  speak  to  her  all  the  mystery 
masked  of  her  being, 

And  it  seemed  to  foresay  the  "cloom  of  her 
Jife  in  its  conflict. 


THE  PASSING  OF  ANN  RUTLEDGE.         291 

Calmly  she  then  put  it  back  to  its  place,  be- 
speaking her  action : 

"I  shall  keep  it  and  die  with  it,  holding  it 
here  in  my  bosom, 

That  rent  heart  of  your  letter  shall  lie  to 
mine  own  the  nearest; 

Buried  with  me  it  shall  be,  when  I  am  laid  in 
my  coffin, 

I  shall  bear  it  up  with  me  to  show  at  the 
high  throne  of  Heaven, 

As  a  witness  of  love  before  God  at  my  coming 
espousals." 


For  a  moment  she  halted  and  gleamed  in  the 

rapture  of  vision, 
Then  she  turned  to  Lincoln  and  spake  him 

her  soul's  consecration: 
"No,  I  dare  not  destroy  it,  nor  leave  it  on 

earth  here  behind  me, 
Thou  hast  sealed  in  this  token  thy  love  with 

mine  everlasting, 
"Which  will  remain  with  thee  here  to  be  lived 

to  its  fullest  fruition. 
Hence  I  must  go,  but  I  now  can  forefeel  that 

I  never  shall  quit  thee, 
I  shall  drop  down  in  thy  life  when  the  crisis 

is  pushing  thee  hardest, 
Shall  ward  off  with  my  Love  the  heaviest 

blows  of  misfortune, 


292    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDOE—BOOK  Xlll. 

Which  will  be  thine,  for  the  greater  the  soul 

the  greater  the  trial.'* 
Sobbing  the  youth  upraised  his  hands  to  his 

face  for  a  moment, 
Torn  by  the  strongest  human  emotion  he  in 

agony  cried  out: 
1 '  Go  not,  leave  me  not  here — my  life  will  be 

death  if  without  thee ; 
I  shall  follow  thee,  follow  at  once — let  the 

grave  be  our  nuptials — 
Why  should  I  wait  t    Every  day  will  be  hence 

for  me  only  a  dying." 


Thus  was  the  flood  of  his  sorrow  bursting  the 

limit  of  reason, 
When  the  maiden  gave  answer,  calling  him 

back  to  his  world-task : 
"Thy    renouncement    must    live     and    be 

wrought  out  by  thee  to  fulfillment, 
To  thy  time  thou  must  show  it  transforming 

thy  life  in  sore  trials. 
Love  thee  below  I  dare  not — but  I  may  out 

of  Heaven. 
Thou  canst  requite  me  from  here  in  thy  deed 

with  memory  deathless. 
My  betrothal  to  thee  is  that — my  only  be- 
trothal." 


THE  PASSING  OF  ANN  RUTLEDGE.         293 

For  a  moment  she  rested,  then  worded  her 

gasp  with  her  last  voice: 
"Over  thee  still  I  shall  hover,  of  Love  the 

pure  bodiless  image, 
And  shall  attend  thee  appearing  just  when 

thou  needest  my  presence ; 
Hear  me,  henceforth  thy  love  is  not  merely  in 

me  to  be  bounded, 
But  to  the  Love  of  all  people  will  rise  up  thy 

love  of  Ann  Rutledge." 


Back  she  fell  on  her  bed,  but  gently  with  pil- 
lows he  propped  her: 

1 ' Go  not,  my  All,  or  let  me  go  with  thee,'*  still 
sobbed  he  his  heart-strokes. 

But  she  was  passing,  though  for  a  look  she 
held  open  her  eyelids, 

Whence  was  gleaming  enskyed  of  Love  the 
bright  benediction, 

With  the  promise  of  Hope,  which  encircled 
her  brow  like  a  sun-wreath. 

Lincoln  felt  in  himself,  as  he  gazed,  her  trans- 
figuration 

Pressing  its  form  on  his  soul  to  stay  there 
imaged  forever ; 

Ghost-like  to  her  he  whispered:  "This  is  my 
marriage  eternal." 


294    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XIII. 

At  the  high  vow  her  eye  throbbed  with  a 
look  of  blest  recognition, 

When  to  her  Lincoln  repeated:  "This  is  my 
marriage  eternal! 

Though  thou  in  life  art  not  mine,  thy  love 
I  shall  love  now  forever, 

Now  I  am  wedded  to  Love  itself,  through  thee 
brought  down  from  Heaven, 

Thee  I  shall  feel  and  re-live  in  all  of  the  deeds 
of  my  future, 

Not  for  one  person  alone,  for  the  Person  him- 
self is  my  passion; 

Over  thy  form  now  leaving  I  pledge  my  faith 
on  God's  altar: 

Unto  Love  eternal  this  is  my  marriage  eter- 
nal. " 


List!  a  rap  was  heard  at  the  door,  which 
pulled  them  back  earthward 

From  beyond,  then  gravely  the  father  en- 
tered announcing: 

"Thy  betrothed  is  here  at  the  threshold  'and 
wishes  to  greet  thee." 


In  steps  Abner,  the  hitherto  absent,  but  now 

again  present, 
Somewhat  surprised  to  see  lone  Lincoln  who 

speedily  darts  out. 


THE  PASSING  OF  ANN  RUTLEDGE.         295 

Ann  looked  up  at  him  steadily  once  with  eye 

unreproachful, 
Then  she  drew  down  slowly  the  curtain  of 

vision  forever, 
Shutting  him  out  from  that  world  which  she 

already  had  entered, 
Leaving  his  law  to  the  man,  but  bearing  her 

love  in  her  bosom 

As  her  soul's  witness  to  Heaven  when  sum- 
moned to  stand  before  Judgment. 
Only  her  hand  she  can  lift  up  a  little — no 

word  she  can  utter — 
Just  the  last  act  of  her  life — but  mark  the 

ring  of  betrothal ! 
How  of  itself  it  slips  off  from  her  finger  now 

shrunken  by  illness, 
Drops  on  the  floor  with  a  bound  and  rapidly 

rolls  toward  the  doorway 
Where  sad  Lincoln  is  passing  out  of  the  house 

with  the  image 
Which  he  will  wear  on  his  heart  till  he  too 

shall  be  summoned  to  Judgment. 


Hastily  Abner  picked  up  the  ring  and  sought 

to  replace  it, 
Though  he  noticed  the  hollew-eyed  socket, 

where  flashed  once  the  ruby; 
Still  by  force  he  attempted  to  put  it  again 

on  its  finger 


296    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  XIII. 

Which    lay    flexless    and    lifeless,    though 

clenched  in  rigidity  mortal 
And  refusing  to  take  back  what  it  had  shed 

with  the  death-stroke. 
That  was  the  fateful  pledge  of  the  law  which 

whelmed  her  in  conflict; 
But  with  the  price  of  her  life  she  paid  off 

the  debt  of  her  promise. 
Abner  soon  gave  up  the  effort,  and  then  with 

a  look  of  foiled  purpose, 
Into  his  pocket  he  thrust  the  woe-laden  ring 

of  betrothal, 
Which  he  once  gave  to  her  when  it  was  set 

with  the  laugh  of  the  ruby, 
And  appeared  to  foretoken  the  hour  of  happy 

espousals; 
But  it  turned  to  an  eye  of  evil,  blood-shot 

in  its  glances, 
Looking  a  demonic  curse  ever-present  into 

the  heart  of  the  maiden. 
Soon  he  with   token   returned  has-  hastened 

away  to  his  business. 


So  she  passes,  renouncing  the  love  of  her  life 

for  her  love's  sake, 
Gone   from  the  world  though  transfigured 

into  a  presence  forever, 
For  she,  eternally  loving,  will  be  the  eternally 

living. 


THE  PASSING  OF  ANN  RUTLEDGE.         297 

Lincoln  beholding  the  deed  of  Ann  Rutledge 

is  with  her  uprisen ; 
Into  the  Love  re-born  which  is  all  Love  he 

wins  the  new  baptism. 
Still  jthat  wound  will  bleed  all  his  days  at 

memory's  time-beat, 
For  the  rift  is  so  deep  that  the  Healer  alone, 

the  one  Healer, 
Curer  of  all  the  scission  within  us  and  also 

without  us, 
Can  the  sorrowless  medicine  send  to  heal  him 

to  wholeness. 


Soul-bowed    Lincoln    again    has    wandered 

alone  to  the  shade-tree, 
Bell-topped  mulberry   hallowed   now    as  a 

shrine  for  his  worship, 
Which  has  beheld  the  holiest  history  lived  by 

the  lovers, 
Where  he  feels  himself  praying  with  her  the 

unspeakable  prayer, 
Who  had  left  him  all  Love  as  her  portion,  not 

merely  her  own  love. 


Crisp  are  the  leaves  which  on  him  drop  down 

in  tender  succession, 
As  they  return  to  the  earth  for  repose  in  the 

graveyard  of  Nature 


298    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RVTLEDGE.—BOOK  XIII. 

Till  they  arise  in  the  spring  new-born  to  a 
fresh  foliation. 

There  he  sits  down  underneath  the  low  sighs 
of  the  breeze-blown  branches, 

"Which  in  tune  with  his  heart-beat  are  breath- 
ing him  strains  of  condolence. 


Soon  he  looks  outward — he  sees  only  vacancy 
where  stood  the  school-house, 

Up  he  springs  with  a  shock  which  shivers  a 
moment  his  being, 

For  the  whole  world  seems  quaking  and  fall- 
ing to  ruins  about  him. 

But  he  recovers  himself  at  the  throb  of  his 
new  consecration, 

While  once  more  he  rehearses  his  vow  as  the 
creed  of  a  life-time : 

"Unto  Love  eternal,  this  is  my  marriage  eter- 
nal." 


The  New  Life. 

Days  of  the  autumn,  one  after  the  other, 

tread  onward  to  winter, 
In  a  procession  long-lined  through  time  like 

a  funeral  cortege, 
Leaves  twirl  silently  down  in  a  dance  with 

the  round  of  each  moment, 
Eendering  back  to  the  mother,  the  Earth,  the 

substance  once  taken, 
Who  digs  yearly  their  tomb  for  their  burial 

over  her  bosom. 
All  the  heart  of  the  maple  had  burst  and  was 

dripping  its  crimson, 
Eagged  and  broken,  and  sere  had  turned  the 

green  coat  of  the  scrub-oak, 
While  the  hickory  grove  was  mortally  yellow 

in  foliage, 

(299) 


300    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUT  LEDGE. —BOOK  XIV. 

And  its  freed  nuts  fell  crashing  through  twigs 

to  the  roots  of  the  parent, 
peeking  to  find  a  new  home  in  the  soil  for 

re-bearing  their  forbears. 
Fruits,  too,  of  orchard  and  forest  were  ripe 

for  a  new  generation, 
Seeming  in  sorrow  to  kiss  good-bye  to  the 

love  of  the  summer 
As  they  started  afresh  in  the  world  to  fulfill 

their  own  life-round. 
Even  the  voice  of  the  Sangamon  sulky  had 

shrunk  to  a  whisper, 
Though  in  its  ripple  still  gleamed  the  silvery 

shine  of  the  minnows, 
Flashing  their  light-points  of  life  in  the  eye 

of  the  stranded  beholder. 


Lincoln  had  seen  the  beloved  one  dying  be- 
fore him,  yet  staying ; 

Sealed  is  that  deed  on  his  soul  with  its  im- 
age enshrined  there  forever, 

Love  universal  now  he  has  witnessed  and 
made  his  redemption, 

Felt  it  within  him  as  time-defying  and  death- 
overcoming, 

Through  the  maiden  who  chooses  for  love  to 
renounce  her  earthly  existence, 

And  to  await  her  bridal  beyond  in  the  pres- 
ence of  Heaven — 


THE  NEW  LIFE.  3Q1 

She  above  and  lie  below — though  by  life  they 
be  sundered. 

Ever  present  she  lives  in  his  toil  as  a  guar- 
dian spirit, 

Who  will  prompt  him  anew  at  each  node  of 
the  fate  sent  upon  him : 

Oft  renewing  the  look  and  the  lisp  of  the 
words  she  last  left  him, 

As  Love 's  presence  vanishing  once  then  abid- 
ing forever. 

Staying  with  her  in  life,  he  hopes  fo  stay  with 
her  hereafter, 

Love,  at  first  mortal  in  birth,  is  his  to  be  re- 
born immortal. 


But  along  with  her  Love  he  will  bear  in  his 

bosom  her  conflict, 
Which  will  endure  to  the  end  of  his  days — 

the  double  soul's  struggle — 
One  side  is  Duty  below,  while  the  other  is 

Love  up  above  him, 
This  will  anchor  his  heart  in  its  trial  and 

light  his  way  onward ; 
He  must  always  re-live  Ann  Butledge's  lot  in 

his  labor, 
Every  day  he  has  to  enact  her  life  and  her 

death  too, 
Harmonizing  the  scission  of  soul  whereof  she 

has  perished, 


302    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  XIV. 

Suffering  fully  her  fate  in  his  own  for  a 

higher  fulfillment, 
Living  her  tragedy  over  and  feeling  its  throes 

in  each  heart-throb 
That  he  may  rise  above  it  the  victor  by  loyal 

endurance ; 
So  he  conquers  the  world  of  harrying  strife 

which  she  could  not, 
Death-transcending  through  death  lives  the 

love  now  of  Abraham  Lincoln. 


Such  is  his  mood  welling  up  from  the  nether- 
most fount  of  his  being, 

As  he  sits  on  the  settle  beneath  the  lone  mul- 
berry's  branches, 

Praying  again  to  the  soul  of  his  soul  the  un- 
speakable prayer, 

Mid  the  slow  rain  of  the  leaflets  of  autumn 
down-falling  to  silence, 

Mid  the  memories  golden  which  drop  from 
the  past  like  a  sun-shower, 

Till  the  moment  supreme  when  the  two  loving 
hearts  were  first  plighted 

Here,  just  here,  underneath  these  sadly- 
draped  leaves  now  inurning. 

Then  he  exclaims  in  a  heart-burst:  ''Here  be 
that  moment's  renewal, 

Here  be  re-vowed  before  this  witnessing  tree 
my  new  troth  plight — 


THE  NEW  LIFE.  393 

Unto  Love  all-embracing  I  give  my  self's 
service  forever." 


Scarcely  had  fallen  the  word  when  suddenly 

there  in  his  presence 
Stood  a  shape  which  at  first  he  took  for  a 

phantom  supernal ; 
But  he  soon  had  discovered  the  look  of  good 

William  the  wainwright, 
Who  began  talking   in   fatherly   tones  that 

quivered  with  pity : 


"  Lin  coin,  you  I  have  seen  as  you  wandered 

around  in  your  sorrow, 
I  have  come  now  to  say  you  a  word  of  mine 

own  deep  experience, 
Thinking  it  might  be  a  comfort  to  help  you 

hold  up  your  burden. 
You  like  me  must  walk  in  the  shadow  through 

life  lent  of  Nature, 
Till  there  dawns  in  the  soul  the  morn  of  a 

new  resurrection, 
Till  you  transform  the  sorrow  of  death  to  the 

death  of  all  sorrow. 
Her  evanishment  is  but  her  real  palingenesy 

lasting, 
If  you  will  make  her  such — ever  re-born  of 

the  love  in  your  spirit. 


304    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RVTLEDGE.—BOOK  XIV. 

I  have  traveled  already  the  road  and  well  do 

I  know  it, 
Faith  you  must  get  in  Dea'th  as  the  God  of 

man's  purification, 
Hard  is  the  ransoming  road — you  can  make 

it  a  curse  or  a  blessing, 
Hard  is  the  test  and  many  fall  in  it — but  you, 

I  vow,  shall  not. ' ' 


Strong  fell  the  words  yet  soothing  the  soul 

of  the  sorrowful  Lincoln, 
Who  not  in  speech  but  in  look  was  beseeching 

a  further  disclosure; 
Turning  his  eyes  to  the  distance  began  sage 

William  the  wainwright: 
"I  have  seen  you  haunting  it  yonder,  the 

green  little  churchyard, 
Where  is  the  fresh-turned  sod  which  covers 

the  mortal  Ann  Eutledge, 
Scarce  could  I  hold  back  the  waters  of  salt 

from  sympathy's  well-head, 
For  my  own  Mariana  lies  there,  not  far  from 

the  maiden; 
Thus  the  cry  of  compassion  was  double,  for 

you  and  myself  too; 
Years  it  took  me  to  wean  my  heart  of  that 

spot  of  round  greensward, 
Where  she  rests  outwardly  buried — and  still 

I  plant  it  with  flowers — 


THE  NEW  LIFE.  305 

But  in  my  soul  she  never  has  died — she  lives 

and  is  active — 
Aye  she  never  is  absent,  but  takes  her  abode 

in  my  being ; 
As  a  God-like  presence  she  comes  to  preside 

in  my  workshop 
Where  as  a  token  of  worship  she  gives  me  thej 

guidance  above  me, 
Which  with  the  years   of  my  toil   becomes 

more  transparent  in  meaning. " 


In  a  revery  far  away  Lincoln  seems  to  be 

gazing, 
When  he  is  waked  by  a  press  of  the  hand  from 

William  the  wainwright: 
"You  remember  the  love  of  the  wheel  which 

you  felt  in  my  hand-strokes 
And  the  prayer  you  heard  which  silently  rose 

from  my  labor ; 
All  of  it  throbbed  from  the  depths  of  love's 

loss  which  once  overwhelmed  me, 
That  is  the  trial  through  which  you  too  are 

now  passing,  to  prove  you, 
Death  you  are  to  transmute  into  life  of  benefi- 
cent action — 
Small  is  my  work — a  wheel — but  yours  will 

be  large,  aye  the  largest." 


306    LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XIV. 

Quickly  the  wainwright  has  vanished,  leaving 
mute  Lincoln  in  study 

Over  the  words  which  seemingly  tapped  the 
hid  fount  of  all  doing, 

Fate  itself  he  has  to  constrain,  the  recom- 
pense getting. 


But  that  image  he  carries  along  in  his  daily 

allotment, 
As  his  spirit's  most  precious  treasure  for  life 

consecrated, 
Strangely  transfigured  to  love,  yea,  the  love 

of  all  Love  such  as  God  is. 
And  he  will  call  up  before  him  that  shape  in 

the  pinch  of  his  trials 

With  it  communing  like  a  Madonna  by  word- 
less petition, 
Or  he  will  tremblingly  tell  of  it  when  in  the 

mood  sympathetic, 
Oft-times  citing   the    verses   whose  musical 

measures  attune  him 
To  restore  the  fair  fleeting  form  of  his  love's 

early  sorrow. 


By  it  then  healed  he  becomes  again  whole  in 
the  time's  fierce  disruption. 

Such  is  the  medicine  which  he  prescribes  to 
his  soul  in  his  scission. 


THE  NEW  LIFE.  307 

That  lie  may  remedy  by  it  the  rent  of  himself 

and  his  people, 
Aye,  the  rent  of  the  universe,  ever  renewing 

its  wholeness. 


The  New  Migration. 

"What  an  outrage!  Nothing  this  winter  they 

did,  just  nothing ! 
Lawmakers  they  may  be  called — to  the  State 

they  are  but  a  scandal, 
Sitting  with  feet  cocked  up  and  drawing  their 

pay  at  Vandalia ! 
Spending  the  time  they  are  paid  for  by  us  in 

telling  vile  stories!" 

Thus  roared  Doctor  Palmetto,  ever  the  vil- 
lage's censor, 
Secretly    giving   a    cut   with  his  razorous 

tongue  at  his  rival : 
"No  canal,  no  railroad,  no  appropriation,  no 

nothing!" 
(308) 


THE  NEW  MIGRATION.  309 

So  his  Noes  lie  kept  piling  up  skyward  till 
God  seemed  a  nothing 

To  whose  glory  he  builded  a  pyramid  lofty 
of  zeros, 

Empty,  hollow-eyed  zeros  which  kept  roll- 
ing asunder 

Just  of  themselves,  like  a  pile  of  dry  skulls 
in  the  Doctor's  own  workshop — 

Damning  all  he  bedamned  too  himself  in  his 
sweep  of  damnation. 


He   was   talking   to   Squire   Ebenezer  who 

strangely  held  silence, 
Who  oft  looked  at  the  hill-top  where  was 

once  standing  the  school-house, 
Which  he  had  reared  as  the  center  of  brain 

for  the  whole  of  New  Salem; 
Now  it  lay  in  its  ashes,  and  broken  the  bell 

of  the  belfry, 
In  whose  harmonious  tones  his  life  flowed 

attuned  to  a  music. 
Though  he  perceived  the  point  of  the  thrust 

in  the  words  of  the  Doctor 
To  be  turned  toward  Lincoln,  the  lawgiver 

loved  of  the  village, 
Also  the  friend  of  himself,  not  a  word  in 

defence  did  he  utter, 
Nor  in  argument  would  he  now  balance  the 

sides  as  his  wont  was. 


310  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XV. 

See  the  Doctor  again  give  a  spank  with  his 
palm  on  the  pine-box 

.Where  the  two  were  sitting  in  front  of  the 
store  of  the  village — 

Store  of  Abner  who  now  has  returned  and 
taken  possession; 

There  he  stands  in  his  door  and  hearkens  the 
speakers  in  silence, 

For  he  too  with  himself  was  holding  a  dili- 
gent query 

Just  concerning  that  future  which  all  the  vil- 
lage now  peers  at, 

Tipped  on  its  pivot  of  destiny  toppling  first 
forward  then  backward; 

But  the  store-keeper  silent  shows  not  a  trace 
of  a  feeling 

For  the  vanishing  town,  for  himself,  or  for 
love  which  has  vanished. 


So  the  keen  Doctor's  momentum  of  tongue 

speeds  on  unopposed : 
"What  a  crotchety  fate  hangs  over  this  work 

of  town-making 
As  it  bubbles  up  here  in  the  West  along  every 

road-side ! 
Look  at  Chicago,  rapidly  rising  to  be  the 

great  city, 
Look  at  New  Salem,  rapidly  sinking  to  be 

but  a  cipher — 


THE  NEW  MIGRATION. 


And  the  cipher  itself  is  doomed  before  long 

to  be  rubbed  out! 
Up  and  down  the  old  rickety  ladder  of  luck 

we  go  wabbling, 
Till  we  drop  in  the  pit  or  wing  upward  a  day 

in  the  sunshine! 
But  with  the  death  of  our  school-house  we 

whisper  in  sober  reflection: 
jNext  we  shall  bury  our  town  and  depart  from 

the  graveyard  forever." 
Up  sprang  the  Doctor  now  hushed,  he  too 

had  a  twinge  of  compassion, 
As  he  turned  away  from  the  store  to  attend 

to  his  sick  folk, 
So  let  him  vanish,  prescribing  for  illness  in 

ailing  New  Salem. 


But  Ebenezer  the  Squire  paced  slowly  his 
pain-laden  footsteps, 

In  his  heart  there  suddenly  surged  a  com- 
munal sorrow 

For  the  child  of  his  mind  whose  growth  he 
had  lovingly  tended. 

Soon  he  turned  down  the  path  to  the  shop 
of  William  the  wainwright, 

Looking  across  the  Sangamon  Valley  into 
the  sunset, 

While  crept  over  the  hills  the  lessening  sheen 
of  the  evening 


312  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XV. 

Turning  to  gloam  of  the  twilight  at  first, 

then  slyly  to  darkness, 

Like  a  huge  dragon  that  laps  in  its  far  fate- 
ful coil  the  whole  earth-ball. 
But  not  a  sound  was  now  heard  of  the  chisel 

or  wimble  or  hammer 
Fitting  the  spoke  in  the  hub  of  the  wheel  and 

arching  the  felloes ; 
And  in  the  shop  of  Peter  the  blacksmith  were 

puffing  no  bellows, 
Silenced  was  song  of  the  sledge  and  the  anvil 

with  ring  of  the  iron, 
Nor  in  their  chorus  would  ever  be  echoed 

again  the  sweet  bell-chimes 
Boiling    adown    from    the    hill-top    where 

perched  the  little  red  school-house. 


Mark !  in  the  yard  stand  covered  with  muslin 
the  wagons  for  moving, 

,Whose  stout  wheels  are  the  last  here  round- 
ed by  "William  the  wainwright; 

Piled  up  with  household  goods  are  the 
wagons  and  ready  for  hitching ; 

What  can  it  mean?  And  who  is  starting  an- 
other migration  ? 

Slowly  out  of  his  shop  to  the  path  steps  Wil- 
liam forebodeful; 

Often  he  wries  his  neck  to  gaze  at  his  ten- 
antless  quarters, 


THE  NEW  MIGRATION.  3^3 

[Where  he  had  happily  wrought  to  a  finish  a 

piece  of  his  life-work. 
Now  he  was  taking  a  look  star-lit  at  what 

he  was  leaving, 
[When  the  Squire  he  met  whose  question  he 

thoughtfully  answered: 


"Well  I  must  quit  New  Salem  moving  my 
destiny  onward 

Over  the  Sangamon  narrow  and  over  the 
broad  Mississippi; 

Somewhere  on  the  frontier  I  shall  help  to  re- 
make a  new  center 

Aye  a  new  wheel  of  a  town  with  its  hub  and 
its  spokes  and  its  felloes 

Baying  out  over  the  land  a  network  which 
draws  men  together, 

For  in  that  practice  alone  can  I  give  my  best 
help  to  my  brother. ' ' 


[With  a  deep  smile  from  his  soul  the  Squire 

responded  approval, 
But  the  wainwright  stopped  not  the  thrust 

of  his  words  in  his  ardor: 
"Full  five  years  have  I  stayed  here  putting 

on  wheels  the  new  country, 
Till  it  will  run  of  itself  for  the  future  with 

help  of  my  pupils, 


314  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XV. 

Two  of  them  whom  I  have  trained  in  my 

workshop  of  soul  and  of  body; 
Thus  the  whole  people  may  rally  as  one  in 

their  communal  spirit 
Then  may  return  each  man  to  himself  in  his 

own  isolation — 
For  we  must  all  go  back  to  ourselves  that  we 

live  too  in  common." 


Here  gray  William  down  drooped  to  the  look 
of  a  long  reminiscence, 

Which  mutely  mooded  the  Squire  when  slow- 
ly again  spoke  the  wainwright : 

"Thrice  before  I  have  migrated  starting 
from  Penn's  Philadelphia, 

Wheeling  three  towns  of  the  backwoods  that 
they  may  better  associate ; 

Old  I  am  getting,  only  once  more  I  fain  would 
be  wheelwright 

To  the  youngest  community  now  being  born 
on  the  border." 


Of  a  sudden  to  William's  surprise  flashed 
Squire  Ebenezer: 

"Oh  that  feeling  how  well  do  I  know  it !  with- 
in me  has  prodded 

Just  the  same  impulse  which  will  never  al- 
low us  to  sit  still 


THE  NEW  MIGRATION. 


In  one  place  for  a  life-time  but  pushes  us 

onward  and  onward 
To  be  town-makers  irresistibly  up  to  the  sun- 

set, 
Sowing  the  land  with  communal  seed,  as  the 

farmer  his  wheatfield  — 
Builders    of   institutions  —  just   that    is  our 

highest  vocation  — 
Architects  all  of  the  town,  the  county,  the 

State  and  the  Nation  ; 
And  still  further  perchance  the  ages  shall 

beckon  us  forward 
To  our  great  destiny  glimpsed  in  a  new  po- 

litical order." 


Here  the  words  of  the  Squire  had  quit  him, 
no  longer  rhapsodic, 

But  he  pensively  whipped  round  from  future 
to  past  recollecting : 

''More  than  once  I  have  moved  since  I  start- 
ed a  youth  in  Kentucky, 

Crossing  the  river  Ohio  to  seek  the  domain 
of  a  Free-State, 

For  I  liked  not  the  name  of  a  slave  in  our 
country  of  freedom; 

Then  to  wild  Indiana  I  came  with  a  com- 
munal bee-hive, 

Swarming  out  of  the  old  to  the  new  on  the 
bafbarous  border; 


316  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XV. 

Lastly  I  hived  me  just  here  in  New  Salem 
with  Eutledge,  its  founder; 

Somehow  I  always  was  chosen  to  hold  up 
the  balance  of  justice, 

"Which  bids  stability  both  in  the  law  and  the 
temper  judicial." 


Quite  unaware    to   himself   the  Squire  had 

lapsed  to  confession, 
As  his  head  he  bent  over  and  whispered  in 

tone  confidential: 
"Let  me  entrust  to  you  what  in  my  heart  I 

now  am,  my  good  William, 
That  unsettling  desire  has  uprooted  me  too, 

I  must  leave  here ; 
On  your  journey  look  back,  you  will  see  me 

crossing  the  river, 
That  is  the  Father  of  Waters  who  roars  in 

a  rage  at  our  passage 
Over  his  torrent  to  where  we  shall  plant  the 

new  communal  structure, 
Such  as  we  bear  in  our  brain  to  re-model  the 

work  of  our  fathers, 
Long  transmitted  by  time  but  unfolded  by  us 

to  the  New- World, 
Which  is  now  starting  to  live  its  own  life 

out  here  in  the  North- West. 
Yea,  a  new  school-house  and  better  shall  rise 

up  in  rejuvenation, 


THE  NEW  MIGRATION,  317 

And  the  new  school-bell  shall  chime  me  again, 
fulfilling  its  motto." 


"That  is  the  best  news  we  ever  have  heard,'* 

said  William  the  wainwright, 
"In  our  young  enterprise  you  were  the  one 

most  needed,  most  wished-for, 
You  shall  be  squire  again  in  our  town  to  arise 

on  the  border 
."Weighing  out  justice  impartial  to  all  in  the 

scales  of  your  brain-pan. 
Others  are  going,  farmers,  mechanics,  young 

folk  of  our  village, 
Which  already  appears  to  me  old,  perchance 

in  its  dotage. 
Uncle  George  Trueblood  now  wavers,  despite 

his  conservative  habit ; 
Sagging  hither  and  yon,  he  may  drop  down 

on  us  to-morrow." 
Silently  thoughtful  the  Squire  still  listened 

the  wainwright  forecasting: 
"Well  do   you   know    that   the  ruffian,  the 

drunkard,  the  criminal  fail  not 
On  the  frontier,  till  the  reign  of  the  law  with 

its  arm  overtake  them; 
You  have  been  given  that  arm  and  still  wield 

it  right  here  in  New  Salem — 
Bring  to  our  new  town  yourself,  0  Squire,  0, 

bring  to  us  Justice." 

ft 


318  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE—BOOK  XV. 

Then  the  wainwright  lowered  his  voice,  as  im- 
parting a  secret : 

"Think  of  it!  all  of  us — aye  myself  too — are 
limit-surpassers, 

Mark!  we  may  sometimes  turn  in  our  zeal 
to  be  limit-transgressors; 

Hear  me!  the  bound-breaker  easily  runs  to 
be  law-breaker  also; 

You  are  to  balance  us  into  the  new  world  out 
of  the  old  one, 

Lest  to  chaos  we  fall  while  striving  up  higher 
to  cosmos, 

Ever  uniting  the  order  transmitted  with  or- 
der arising, 

Ever  transforming  the  old  institution  through 
freedom  upstorming." 


Meditatively  Squire  Ebenezer  to  William  re- 
sponded : 

"Let  me  grant  it — once  more  I  would  have 
me  a  little  land-clearing, 

That  I  may  see  our  young  West  fast  slough- 
ing its  skin  of  wild  Nature ; 

But  far  deeper  I  long  for  the  days  of  my 
happy  town-making, 

Raising  once  more  the  communal  giant  in- 
formed of  my  spirit 

That  he  put  on  his  body  a  garment  of  dwell- 
ings and  workshops, 


THE  NEW  MIGRATION. 


Building  himself  the  germinal  home  of  the 

new  institution. 
Gladly  would  I  have  Lincoln  along  in  the 

young  habitation, 
His  is  a  soul  that  is  filled  with  the  soul  of  the 

age's  right  order, 
But  he  may  cling  to  the  spot  which  entombs 

his  memories  tender." 


Both  the  men  lapsed  to  the  silence  of  thought, 
for  they  too  remembered — 

Till  Ebenezer  again  in  his  words  repeated 
his  heart-beats : 

"May  I  uprear  once  more  the  round  school- 
house  voiced  with  the  school-bell, 

.Which  in  my  dying  hour  I  hope  to  hear  ting- 
ling its  message 

That  I  too  shall  arise  from  my  death  to  my 
heirship  immortal." 


Then  the  wainwright  lit  up  his  reply  with  the 
light  of  his  visage : 

"Friend,  delay  not,  for  this  is  the  highest  of 
human  attainment : 

Every  minute  to  live  in  our  work  the  life  ever- 
lasting; 


320  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XV. 

Tims,  only  thus,  do  we  win  it  from  time  and 

keep  it  forever, 
Even  New  Salem  shall  still  be  re-lived  in  a 

new  resurrection." 


Resurgam. 

Solitude  now  is  the  soul  of  sad  Lincoln  fleeing 
all  friendship, 

For  the  first  time  in  his  life  he  shuns  where 
the  people  assemble, 

He  no  more  is  heard  telling  a  story  or  anec- 
dote mirthful ; 

Inward  he  turns  and  passes  his  days  shut  up 
in  his  self's  world, 

Even  the  sound  of  a  laugh  can  stir  him  to 
tears  of  fresh  sorrow. 

All  that  he  in  the  past  has  been  is  melting 
within  him, 

Character,  purpose  in  life,  his  faith,  his  veri- 
est self  hood, 

All  have  been  flung  in  the  fiery  furnace  of 
Death  to  be  tested ; 

(321) 


322  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XVI. 

Sometimes  his  reason  would  sink  out  of 
sight  in  the  flood  of  affliction, 

Dipped  for  a  moment  into  the  depths  of  man 's 
deepest  experience. 

Oft  he  would  steal  unseen  to  a  new-made 
grave  for  his  solace, 

In  the  mortal  to  rise  to  communion  with  what 
is  immortal, 

Sorrow  renewing  his  love,  but  his  love  too  re- 
newing his  sorrow, 

Giving  the  discipline  needful  to  mount  from 
all  bonds  of  misfortune, 

Till  the  loved  one  no  longer  is  past  but  eter- 
nally present. 


Thus  the  mourner  has  stamped  on  his  heart 

the  deed  of  Ann  Eutledge, 
Imaging  her  in  her  love  he  can  rise  into  love 

universal. 
She  will  spring  out  of  air  to  him  when  he  is 

harried  by  trouble, 
Or  when  hit  by  men's  hate  he  is  tempted  in 

vengeance  to  hit  back; 
She  will  haunt  him  ghost-like  in  his  nigh't  till 

again  he  shall  love  her, 
If  in  the  trials  of  time  he  forget  her  deed's 

benediction. 


RESURGAM.  £23 

Days  wore  away,  more  sure  of  himself  he  be- 
gan to  be  growing, 

iWhen  he  resolved  to  visit  the  Lady  Eulalia 
Lovelace, 

Known  as  the  comforter  gentle  of  grief -laden 
souls  in  New  Salem ; 

But  at  the  door  of  the  mansion  he  met  an- 
other possessor, 

Who  to  a  question  replied  that  the  Lady  had 
moved  to  Virginia, 

To  the  gray  manse  of  her  father  and  fore- 
fathers, for  her  two  boys '  sake. 

They  must  be  gentlemen  bred  on  the  good 
old  colonial  pattern 

Henceforth  eschewing  the  mode  of  the  life 
of  the  pioneer  western, 

Lapsing  far  back  to  the  past  from  the  work 
of  the  State-building  future. 


' i  Still  another  fresh  stroke !  How  the  world 
seems  going  to  pieces ! 

That  is  not  all — she  appears  to  me  fated !  so 
are  her  children!" 

Thus  he  sighed  for  the  loss  of  the  Lady  Eu- 
lalia Lovelace 

Who  to  the  town  had  given  the  grace  of  her 
courteous  presence, 

Lending  her  lordly  home  to  works  of  the 
worthiest  living, 


324   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XVI. 

Which  enkindled  a  civilized  gleam  on  the  bar- 
barous border. 

Still  she  could  not  help  showing  the  longing 
look  of  an  exile 

For  the  seats  of  the  old  cavaliers  who  cen- 
tered at  Eichmond, 

Though  upon  them  a  Fury  already  was  writ- 
ing destruction, 

iWhich  in  his  mood  the  torn  Lincoln  could 
feel  through  the  time  and  the  distance. 


Then  as  he  slowly  returned  to  the  highway, 
painfully  pensive, 

He  was  met  by  a  line  of  new  wagons  just 
starting,  not  backward, 

But  still  forward  away  to  the  West  in  strong 
aspiration ; 

Merely  he  said:  "Again  are  coming  the  mov- 
ers, as  usual — 

Wave  of  that  sea  of  migration  which  keeps 
rolling  on  Westward." 


But  at  the  second  keen  glance  he  noted  a  vis- 
age familiar, 

Whence  trilled  the  tone  of  a  voice  he  often 
had  heard  in  New  Salem. 

"Friend  of  my  heart,  my  good  Lincoln,  I  now 
am  going  to  leave  you, 


RESURGAM.  325 

I  Have  not  seen  you  for  days,  else  surely  I 

would  have  informed  you; 
Off  I  must  march,  once  more,  over-stepping 

the  wide  Mississippi, 
Helping  to  found  a  new  town  and  start  it  to 

running ; 
Come  along  now — next  year  from  our  State 

we  shall  send  you  to  Congress." 


Lincoln  shook  No  with  his  head  and  saddened 

more  deeply  in  feature, 
But  the  voice  spoke  on,  though  touched  with 

a  tone  sympathetic : 
11  Twice  already  I  did  thus,  but  this  I  feel  is 

my  last  time; 
Mine  is  to  build,  but  not  houses  so  much  as  the 

village's  order, 
And  discreetly  by  law  to  direct  the  communal 

welfare." 


That  was  Squire  Ebenezer  who  spoke,  the 

fountain  of  Justice, 
Which  he  established  wherever  he  founded  a 

town  on  the  border ; 
This  when  done  he  persuaded  the  people  to 

b"uild  a  good  school-house 
"With  its  resonant  bell  as  its  voice  to  the 

young  and  the  older, 


326   LINCOLN  ANT)  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XVI. 

Calling  together  the  brain  of  the  place  for 

lesson  and  lecture ; 
Thus  a  small  university  communal  rose  at  the 

cente 
Faintly  forecasting  the  culminant  height  of 

the  new  education. 
Deeper  than  anything  else  this  lurks  in  the 

Squire  Ebenezer : 
That  the  fate  of  the  school-house  presages 

the  fate  of  the  village ; 
Yea  he  would  carry  his  foreglimpse  up  to  the 

State  and  the  Nation. 


Lincoln  stood  dazed  for  a  moment,  then 
mused  to  his  friend  in  a  study : 

"I  have  heard  you  say  that  before,  still  I 
thought  that  you  would  not — 

But  methinks  that  the  soul  of  this  town  is 
now  leaving  its  body, 

That  which  built  it  and  kept  it  alive  is  leav- 
ing its  members, 

Aye  the  whole  world  is  to  me  but  a  corpse 
with  spirit  departed." 


Heartfull  he  turned  from  his  friend,  yet  look- 
ing a  farewell  unworded, 

Scarce  ten  steps  had  he  trod — who  is  this 
whom  he  suddenly  faces? 


RESURGAM.  327 

William  the  wainwright  is  migrating  also 

with  Peter  the  blacksmith; 
Peter  the  chatterer,  now  well-washed  starts 

playing  his  banter : 
"Abraham  Lincoln,  you  are  the  cause  of  my 

leaving  New  Salem, 
It  is  you  who  will  fetch  here  new  wheels,  not 

ironed,  but  iron, 
When  law-making  next  winter  you  go  down 

again  to  Vandalia." 


So  chaffed  the  blacksmith  a  humorous  lurn 
to  divert  Lincoln's  sadness, 

When  the  wainwright  added  with  eyes  of 
melting  condolence : 

1  'With  the  solace  of  time  you  may  follow  us 
when  we  have  settled." 


Then  at  once  burst  up  a  geyser  of  sobs  from 

an  underworld  molten, 
As  the  heart-hit  mourner  gave  vent  to  the 

seething  within  him : 
"No,  I  shall  hover  around  this  fragment  of 

earth  for  a  life-time, 
Here  is  the  shrine  of  my  soul  whose  love  I 

shall  never  abandon, 
Till  with  its  image  seared  on  my  life  I  shall 

stand  up  for  Judgment," 


328   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XVI. 

Off  he  then  turned  to  catch  for  his  sighs  a 

full  breath  of  freedom, 
While  the  train  of  the  wagons  went  wavering 

over  the  landscape 
In  a  rise  and  a  fall  as  they  wound  through 

prairie  and  woodland 
Joyously  onward  into  the  roar  of  the  roiled 

Mississippi, 
Bearing  along  in  their  bosom  the  communal 

soul  of  New  Salem, 
Which  will  arise  when  over  the  River  and 

take  a  new  body, 
Yea  in  thousands  and  thousands  of  bodies 

afresh  resurrected, 
Symboled  of  old  in  the  sacred  brand  borne 

to  the  young  town-hall. 


When  the  last  white  wisp  of  a  wagon  had 

swooned  in  the  distance, 
Lincoln  had  strolled  to  the  knoll  where  stood 

once  the  centering  school-house, 
Now  but  a  round  ashen  heap  in  whose  midst 

lay%the  wreck  of  the  belfry, 
There  as  he  dreamily  stepped,  he  stumbled 

his  foot  on  a  fragment, 
Chip  of  the  bell  which  tingled  a  resonance  to 

him  though  broken, 
As  if  it  still  would  remind  him  of  days  when 

it  called  him  to  study, 


RESURGAM. 


329 


.When  lie  could  Hear  the  maidenly  tones  of 

Ann  Kutledge  reciting, 
Whom  he  weened  to  be  speaking  just  now  as 

the  voice  of  the  ruins — 
Bodiless  voice,  yet  strangely  concordant  with 

hers,  from  the  ashes ; 
Then  he  bent  over  and  read  the  weird  word 

of  the  school-bell's  inscription, 
Which    in    each    letter    came    tongued    on 

breaths  of  the  air  by  some  presence — 
But  behold !  there  falls  on  his  ear  a  new  voice 

now  incarnate. 
Still  mid  ruins  it  speaks,  in  accent  familiar 

yet  trembling, 
What!  'tis  Mentor  Graham  grown  old,  the 

school-master  faithful 
Haunting  in  anguish    of   soul   the  dolorous 

scene  of  his  life-work, 
Yet  with  gushes  of  heavenward  hope  in  the 

downpour  of  sorrows; 

Like  a  specter  he  spoke  to  the  seeming  spec- 
ter of  Lincoln: 


' '  Though  I  descend  to  the  sunset  of  life,  new- 
ly aged  in  a  night-time, 

I  must  go  with  the  rest  and  elsewhere  follow 
my  calling; 

Mine  is  to  teach  the  rude  border,  I  have  to 
move  on  with  migration— 


330   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XVI. 

But,  0,  Lincoln,  thou  shalt  remain  my  remem- 
brance eternal, 

Waiting  for  birth  the  future  lies  nestled  with- 
in thee  already, 

Pupil  of  all  my  pupils,  through  thee  I  shall 
live  everlasting, 

Always  reborn  in  thy  life  with  the  work  which 
is  mine  stamped  upon  thee ! 

And  this  town  though  it  die  will  not  fade 
from  the  soul  of  the  people, 

Sacred  it  shall  be  in  memory,  dare  I  pres- 
sage,  by  thy  presence, 

These  rich  days  of  thy  youth  here  passed 
make  it  youthful  forever, 

Though  from  the  map  it  be  blotted  by  fate,  no 
sign  of  it  peeping, 

Still  it  will  last  as  a  spirit  and  even  be  sung 
of  with  Lincoln." 


Strange,  but  the  schoolmaster,  fluid  before, 
turns  suddenly  solid, 

And  his  features  so  molten  shoot  into  the 
crystals  of  sternness, 

As  he  starts  to  deliver  the  word  of  a  judg- 
ment supernal: 

''Not  without  reason  divine  this  lot  has  be- 
fallen New  Salem, 

Frequently  have  I  been  threatened  with  ill  on 
account  of  my  doctrines  j 


RE  '8V  'RO  AM. 


For  its  act  of  suppressing  free  speech,  itself 

is  suppressed  now, 
When  it  threw  the  lecturer  into  the  river,  it 

followed, 
When  it  burnt  up  his  pages  of  print,  it  set 

fire  to  my  school-house, 
Written  all  over  these  ashes  of  death  I  read 

retribution, 
Flamed  down  on  it  from  Heaven  for  damn- 

able deeds  like  Gomorrah." 


So  the  good  Mentor  burst  forth  in  one  of  his 

rages  prophetic, 
With  a  tone  of  the  voice  of  the  preacher,  the 

thunderous  Cartright ; 
First  he  would  flare  himself  out  at  the  world, 

then  wheel  about  inward, 
Not  at  all  sparing  himself  in  his  faults  as  he 

sighed  his  confession : 
"And  I  too  must  come  under  the  doom  of 

the  dying  New  Salem, 
Forth  I  must  go  and  begin  the  new  school  of 

the  backwoods, 
With  it  the  house  and  the  bell  in  the  belfry 

shall  be  resurrected, 
I  shall  drop  in  my  time  but  my  work  must 

be  made  self-renewing 
Through  those  pupilled  by  me  with  my  im- 
press— such  I  deem  thou  art." 


332   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XVI. 

Mentor  then  stooped  and  took  up  a  handful 
of  dust,  still  reflecting : 

"This  old  body  belongs  to  these  ashes,  but 
I  do  not  surely, 

I  am  to  make  Death  die,  am  to  turn  on  him- 
self the  Destroyer, 

Always  rehearing  my  life  in  a  higher  regen- 
eration.*' 


With  an  eye  of  refulgence  the  speaker  then 
gleamed  upon  Lincoln : 

"Death  is  a  schoolmaster,  stern  and  impar- 
tial, far  sterner  than  I  am, 

I  too  have  gone  to  his  school  and  have  tasted 
his  discipline  mortal, 

Greatest  of  schoolmasters  is  he  with  weight- 
iest lore,  if  you  learn  it ; 

That  is  your  task  now,  0  Lincoln,  Death  is 
teaching  your  lesson 

Out  of  the  sorrow  of  love  lost  to  rise  into  love 
that  is  deathless, 

Self -undone  is  the  teacher  when  his  high  work 
is  perfected; 

If  thou  wouldst  live,  thou  art  dead— if  thou 
wouldst  die,  thou  art  living." 

i 

As  they  walked  and  talked  mid  the  ruins  in 
sombre  reflection, 


RESURGAM.  333 

They  had  come  to  the  fragment  of  bell  with 
its  Latin  inscription 

Eeadable  still,  yea  perfect,  without  one  break 
in  a  letter. 

Fire  had  purified  every  line  of  the  word  to 
new  splendor, 

As  it  lay  in  its  refuse  upturned  still  gleam- 
ing its  message. 


Then  spoke  the  schoolmaster  tremulous  still 

with  the  quake  of  his  judgment  : 
"That  inscription  foresays    that    this    bell 

shall  arise  and  this  schoolhouse, 
Yea,  this  village,  now  dead  on  the  march  of 

civilisation ; 

I,  too,  this  schoolmaster,  I  shall  arise  new- 
born in  vocation. 
Look  again  at  the  word !  spell  the  gleam  of  its 

mystical  letters : 
Once  I  found  it  upon  a  mossed  tombstone,  and 

made  it  my  prayer, 
Then  on  the  school  bell  I  stamped  it  to  ring 

out  over  the  country, 
Word  of  my  deepest  faith,  true  voice  of  the 

universe  also. 
Sol  may  burn  like  this  schoolhouse,  yet  will 

arise  with  the  aeons, 
Cosmos,  though  ever  dying,  is  ever  afresh 

resurrected.'* 


334   LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE.—BOOK  XVI. 

Then  the  schoolmaster  centered  his  eye-shot 
right  into  Lincoln's : 

"And  the  loved  one  who  passed  will  arise 
in  a  new  resurrection, 

You  will  arise  from  grief  of  the  mortal  to 
love  the  immortal, 

That  is,  my  Lincoln,  thy  schoolmaster's  les- 
son, the  last  one, 

Make  it  thine  own  to  guide  all  thy  coming 
career — thou  wilt  need  it." 


So  they  parted,  uplifted  each  man  with  a  ful- 
ness of  vision. 
Dimly  already  the  Dawn  had  stretched  out 

her  daintiest  finger, 
Laying  it  on  a  white  cloud  as  if  she  were 

touching  the  bed-clothes, 
Eeady  to  spring  from  her  couch  in  the  East 

with  a  kiss  for  New  Salem, 
Leaving  her  human  Tithonus  behind  as  the 

ghost  of  a  husband, 
"While  she  a  Goddess  undying  embraces  in 

love  the  whole  earth-ball. 
Lincoln  had  wandered  away  in  the  night  to 

the  mulberry's  shadow, 
Shrouding  himself  in  the  mantle  redoubled  of 

Nature's  own  gloaming, 
Twofold  that  mantle  of  darkness,  without  him 

and  also  within  him, 


RESURGAM.  335 

Till  he  is  silently  touched  by  the  tenderest 

glance  of  the  twilight, 
Which  is  the  herald  of  day,  new-born  for  the 

world  and  for  man  too. 
Up  he  leaps  from  his  seat  as  if  hearing  the 

soul  of  Aurora, 
Hastes  with  a  hope  in  his  heart  to  the  ashes 

which  tell  of  the  schoolhouse, 
There  to  search  for  the  word  of  the  promise 

which  heartened  him  bravely. 
Soon  he  has  found  the  fragment  of  bell  that 

holds  the  inscription, 
This  he  takes  in  his  hand  arid  reads  Hy  the 

light  which  is  dawning, 
Tenderly  bears  it  away  from  the  dust  to  a 

destiny  higher. 


Now  at  the  head  of  the  fresh-sodded  mound 
which  covers  Ann  Butledge 

Love  has  enthroned  the  talisman  hinting  the 
turn  of  the  ages, 

Whispering  hope  unto  man  and  the  sun  and 
the  stars — BESUEGAM. 


iistorit  Intimations. 


BOOK  I.  The  village  of  New  Salem  lay  on 
the  Sangamon  Eiver,  about  twenty  miles 
north-west  of  Springfield,  capital  of  Illinois. 
It  was  founded  in  1829  (the  date  1828  is  the 
one  given  by  Herndon).  It  lasted  some  ten 
or  twelve  years,  suddenly  springing  up  into 
bustling  activity,  and  then  rapidly  declining. 
,At  present  "a  few  crumbling  stones  are  all 
that  attest  its  former  existence."  It  was 
situated  "  on  a  bluff  a  hundred  feet  above  the 
surrounding  country."  At  the  foot  of  this 
bluff  rolled  the  Sangamon,  where  stood  the 
mill  on  whose  dam  Lincoln's  boat  was  strand- 
ed (April,  1831) — an  incident  witnessed  by 
the  people  of  the  village  standing  on  the  hill- 
side. This  was  Lincoln's  introduction  to  New 
Salem,  where  he  lived  about  five  years,  in 
various  employments. 

Across  the  river  from  the  village  the  val- 
ley of  the  river  is  about  half  a  mile  in  width, 
reaching  back  to  the  hills.  "The  town  never 
contained  more  than  fifteen  houses,  all  of 
them  built  of  logs;  but  it  had  an  energetic 
population  of  perhaps  one  hundred  persons" 
(336) 


HISTORIC  INTIMATIONS.  337 

(Miss  Tarbell,  Life  of  Lincoln).  "By  1840, 
Petersburg,  two  miles  down  the  Eiver,  had 
absorbed  its  business  and  population." 
(Ditto.) 

BOOK  H.  In  the  spring  of  1832  the  little 
steamboat  whose  name  was  Talisman,  came 
puffing  up  the  Sangamon  from  Bardstown 
past  New  Salem  to  the  landing-place  near 
Springfield.  Lincoln  was  the  pilot,  as  he  well 
knew  the  little  stream,  and  along  the  banks 
the  people  gathered  hailing  the  advent  of  the 
first  steamboat.  Cannons  and  shotguns  added 
to  the  noise:  men  and  boys  afoot  and  on 
horseback  followed  the  vessel.  On  the  bluff 
at  New  Salem  stood  a  large  expectant  crowd, 
having  a  tumultous  jollification  over  the  out- 
look upon  a  dazzling  future — all  of  which 
rested  upon  the  dream  of  a  navigable  San- 
gamon. The  steamboat  had  actually  come  all 
the  way  from  Cincinnati  and  thus  seemed  to 
suggest  the  connection  of  the  Sangamon  coun- 
try with  the  rest  of  the  world  by  naviga- 
tion. 

Says  Herndon:  "I  remember  the  occa- 
sion well  for  two  reasons:  it  was  my  first 
sight  of  a  steamboat,  and  the  first  time  I 
ever  saw  Mr.  Lincoln,  though  I  never  became 
acquainted  with  him  till  his  second  race  for 
the  Legislature,  in  1834.  After  passing  New 
Salem  I  and  the  other  boys,  on  horseback, 


338  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 

followed  the  boat,  riding  along  the  banks." 
Even  the  poet  was  not  absent,  but  sang  the 
exploit  in  a  little  epic  of  which  the  following 
is  a  verse : 

"Illinois  suckers,  young  and  raw, 
Were  strung  along  the  Sangamaw 
To  see  a  boat  come  up  by  steam; 
They  surely  thought  it  was  a  dream." 

BOOK  III.  Lincoln 's  first  candidacy  for  the 
Legislature  (in  1832)  was  unsuccessful.  Still 
he  always  looked  back  to  his  race  with  pride, 
saying  in  a  brief  autobiography  written  long 
afterwards  that  his  own  precinct  gave  277 
votes  for  him,  and  only  7  against  him —  which 
certainly  indicated  his  local  popularity.  But 
in  the  rest  of  the  county  he  was  not  well 
known.  Before  going  to  the  Black  Hawk 
War  in  1832,  he  had  announced  his  candidacy 
and  had  issued  an  address  to  the  voters, 
which  is  still  preserved  (See  Lincoln's 
Works,  by  Nicolay  and  Hay).  In  1834  he 
was  elected  representative  to  the  State  Leg- 
islature, which  then  held  its  sessions  at  Van- 
dalia,  the  capital.  In  this  second  race  he 
seems  to  have  largely  recovered  from  his  de- 
lusion— which  he  shared  with  the  people- 
that  the  Sangamon  was  navigable. 

BOOK  IV.  Already  in  1834  the  agitation 
for  the  new  means  of  intercommunication— 


HISTORIC  INTIMATIONS.  339 

the  canal  and  railroad — had  begun.  Later 
it  rose  to  the  proportions  of  a  great  bubble 
which  exploded  and  left  the  State  deeply  in 
debt  and  facing  a  financial  crises.  Lincoln 
was  an  ardent  supporter  of  these  "  internal 
improvements. ' ' 

On  all  sides  were  signs  of  the  great  migra- 
tion to  the  North- West.  The  population  of 
Illinois  (set  down  as  269,974  souls  in  1835), 
had  almost  doubled  in  half  a  dozen  years. 
Chicago  had  begun  to  develop  in  the  north- 
eastern part  of  the  State. 

Lincoln  was  commissioned  Postmaster  at 
New  Salem  May  7,  1833,  under  the  federal 
administration  of  Andrew  Jackson.  The  mail 
arrived  once  a  week,  not  in  great  quantity,  so 
that  tEe  saying  soon  became  current  that  he 
carried  the  post-office  in  his  hat.  It  has  also 
been  handed  down  that  he  read  the  news- 
papers which  came  in  the  mail,  with  consent 
of  their  owners,  and  then  delivered  them. 
Says  Herndon:  "Mr.  Lincoln  used  to  tell 
me  when  he  had  a  call  to  go  to  the  country, 
he  placed  inside  his  hat  all  the  letters  belong- 
ing to  the  people  of  the  neighborhood  and 
distributed  them  along  the  way." 

BOOK  V.  Ann  Eutledge  was  the  daughter 
of  the  first  citizen  of  New  Salem,  who  was 
also  one  of  its  founders — James  Ru'tledge, 
born  in  South  Carolina  and  related  to 


340  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 

the  distinguished  family  of  that  name.  Says 
Herndon,  who  knew  her:  "She  was  a  beau- 
tiful girl — the  most  popular  young  lady  in 
the  village.  One  of  her  strong  points  was  her 
dexterity  in  the  use  of  the  needle.  At  every 
quilting  Ann  was  a  necessary  adjunct,  and 
her  nimble  fingers  drove  the  needle  swifter 
than  anyone's  else.  Lincoln  used  to  escort 
her  to  and  from  these  quilting  bees,  and  on 
one  occasion  even  went  into  the  house." 

But  she  was  already  engaged  to  a  success- 
ful young  merchant  of  New  Salem,  who  went 
under  the  name  of  McNeall,  but  whose  real 
name  was  McNamar.  He  had  left  town  in 
the  spring  of  1834,  with  the  design  of  return- 
ing soon;  but  he  delayed,  and  soon  stopped 
writing  to  his  betrothed.  Nobody  knew  what 
had  become  of  him,  or  what  were  his  pur- 
poses. Ann  especially  was  in  doubt:  had  he 
deserted  her?  Anyhow  at  this  juncture  Lin- 
coln gradually  became  her  suitor. 

BOOK  VI.  Peter  Cartright  represents  the 
preacher  of  the  frontier  better  than  any  other 
known  individual.  He  has  left  an  autobiog- 
raphy which  gives  a  simple  account  of  his 
remarkable  career.  Above  all  men  of  his 
class  he  knew  how  to  stir  up  the  religious 
susceptibility  of  the  borderer.  He  Fad  come 
at  an  early  day  with  Southern  immigrants 
.(from  Tennessee  and  Kentucky)  and  had  set- 


HISTORIC  INTIMATIONS. 


tied  in  tlie  Sangamon  Valley,  not  far  from 
Springfield.  He  was  probably  the  greatest 
of  all  circuit-riders,  Ms  circuit  at  first  "ex- 
tending from  Kaskaskia  to  Galena."  He 
was  a  Methodist  and  the  very  king  of  reviv- 
als and  camp-meetings.  The  South  he  had 
quit  on  account  of  his  dislike  of  slavery; 
,still  he  was  a  strong  Democrat  of  the  per- 
fervid  Jacksonian  type.  He  did  not  hesitate 
to  mix  politics  with  his  religion,  being  elect- 
ed a  member  of  the  Illinois  Legislature  in 
1828  and  in  1832;  in  the  latter  year  Lincoln 
was  a  candidate,  but  was  beaten.  Cartright 
was  a  candidate  for  Congress  against  Lin- 
coln in  1846,  but  was  badly  defeated.  The 
two  men  were  of  a  different  order  of  mind  ; 
they  clashed  repeatedly,  both  in  the  political 
and  religious  domains,  though  both  were  anti- 
slavery  and  born  Southerners. 

Jack  Kelso,  the  poetical  vagabond  of  New 
Salem,  reciter  of  Shakespeare  and  Burns,  has 
a  place  in  all  of  Lincoln's  Biographies. 

BOOK  VII.  "As  Lincoln  pleaded  and 
pressed  his  cause,  the  Rutledges  and  all  New 
Salem  encouraged  his  suit.  McNamar's  un- 
explained absence,  and  his  apparent  neglect 
furnished  outsiders  with  all  the  arguments 
needed  to  encourage  Lincoln  and  convince 
Ann.  Although  the  attachment  was  growing 
and  daily  becoming  an  intense  and  mutual 


342  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 

passion,  the  young  lady  remained  firm  and 
almost  inflexible.  She  was  passing  through 
another  fire.  A  long  struggle  with  her  feel- 
ings followed.  (Herndon  and  Weik's  Lin- 
coln, Vol.  1,  p.  ,128.) 

"All  would  have  gone  well  if  the  young 
girl  could  have  dismissed  the  haunting  mem- 
ory of  her  old  lover.  The  possibility  that 
she  had  wronged  him,  that  he  loved  her  still, 
though  she  now  loved  another,  that  she  had 
perhaps  done  wrong,  produced  a  torturing 
conflict."  (Miss  TarbelPs  Lincoln,  Vol.  1, 
p.  119.) 

It  should  be  noted  that  Ann  Eutledge  had 
a  strongly  religious  element  in  her  nature. 
It  is  this  element  which  on  the  one  hand  in- 
tensified her  conflict  and  on  the  other  im- 
parted to  her  a  great  consolation. 

BOOK  VIIL  Vandalia,  the  capital  of  the 
State  from  1820,  was  a  town  of  less  than  a 
thousand  inhabitants  when  Lincoln  arrived 
there  for  the  opening  of  the  Assembly,  De- 
cember 1,  1834.  This  was  composed  of  26 
senators  and  55  representatives,  nearlly  all 
of  Southern  origin,  mainly  from  Kentucky 
and  Virginia.  The  bulk  of  the  great  migra- 
tion came  from  the  same  source.  "  There 
were  but  few  Eastern  men,  for  there  was  still 
a  strong  prejudice  in  the  State  against  Yan- 
kees." 


HISTORIC  INTIMATIONS.  343 

''There  was  a  preponderance  of  jean  suits, 
like  Lincoln's,  in  the  Assembly,  and  there 
were  occasional  coon-skin  caps  and  buckskin 
pantaloons.  Nevertheless,  more  than  one 
member  showed  a  studied  garb  and  a  courtly 
manner.  Some  of  the  best  blood  of  the  South 
went  into  the  making  of  Illinois,  and  it 
showed  itself  from  the  first  in  the  Assembly." 
(Much  more  is  to  be  found  in  the  accounts  of 
early  Illinois  histories  and  in  the  Lincoln 
biographies — see  Miss  Tarbell's  Lincoln, 
Chapter  VIII.) 

"At  this  session  of  the  Legislature  (1834 
-5),  Lincoln  was  anything  but  conspicuous. 
His  name  appears  so  seldom  that  we  are 
prone  to  think  that  he  contented  himself  with 
listening  to  border  oratory  and  with  absorb- 
ing his  due  proportion  of  parliamentary  law" 
(Herndon).  Other  reasons  can  be  given. 

"Schemes  of  vast  internal  improvements 
attracted  a  retinue  of  log-rollers — members 
of  the  'third  body'  among  whom  at  this  ses- 
sion was  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  who  had  come 
from  Vermont  only  the  year  before,"  but 
was  already  in  pursuit  of  an  office,  that  of 
State's  Attorney.  (Herndon.) 

"What  opinion  each  formed  of  the  other, 
or  what  the  extent  of  their  acquaintance,  we 
do  not  know,"  adds  Herndon.  Possibly 
something  is  hinted  in  the  tradition  fhat  Lin- 


344  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 

coin  said  of  him  after  their  first  meeting: 
"He  is  the  least  man  I  have  ever  seen." 

BOOK  IX  .  Says  Herndon,  who  carefully  in- 
vestigated this  affair:  "McNamar,  true  to 
his  promise,  drove  into  New  Salem  in  the  fall 
of  1835,  with  his  mother  and  brothers  and 
sisters.  They  had  come  through  from  New 
York,  with  all  their  portable  goods  in  a 
wagon."  Their  arrival  took  place  a  short 
time  after  the  passing  of  Ann  Butledge.  "With- 
in a  year  McNamar  married  another  woman 
— which  fact  may  be  taken  as  furnishing  the 
key  to  his  conduct. 

BOOK  X.  Since  the  Black  Hawk  War,  the 
northern  part  of  the  State  had  been  rapidly 
filling  up  with  settlers.  There  had  been  a 
good  deal  of  agitation  for  the  removal  of  the 
Capital  to  a  more  central  locality.  This  was 
accomplished  at  the  session  of  1836-7,  by 
the  nine  legislators  from  Sangamon  County, 
called  the  Long  Nine,  on  account  of  their 
stature,  "all  of  them  measuring  over  six  feet 
in  height  and  over  two  hundred  pounds  in 
weight,"  combined  with  intellectual  ability 
above  the  average.  Says  Herndon:  "The 
friends  of  other  cities  fought  Springfield  bit- 
terly, but  under  Lincoln's  leadership,  the 
Long  Nine  contested  with  them  every  inch 
of  the  way,"  and  finally  won.  In  the  preced- 
ing session  (1834-5)  there  had  been  only  talk 


HISTORIC  INTIMATIONS.  345 

of  the  removal,  not  agreeable  to  the  people 
of  Vandalia. 

Also  during  these  years  the  agitation 
against  slavery  began  to  make  its  appearance 
in  the  West.  Taunts,  jeers,  persecution,  as- 
sassination even,  greeted  the  early  apostles 
of  reform.  The  attitude  of  Lincoln  was 
anti-slavery,  but  he  disclaimed  the  name  of 
abolitionist.  (See  Kis  famous  protest  in  the 
Legislature,  dated  1837.) 

BOOK  XI.  After  Lincoln's  return  from  his 
first  session  at  Vandalia,  he  became  engaged 
to  Ann  Rutledge.  "Still  the  ghost  of  another 
love  would  often  rise  unbidden  before  her," 
says  Herndon.  "Within  her  bosom  raged 
the  conflict  which  finally  undermined  her 
health.  Late  in  the  summer  she  took  to  her 
bed.  A  fever  was  burning  in  her  head.  Dur- 
ing the  latter  days  of  her  illness,  her  physi- 
cian had  forbidden  visitors  to  enter  her  room, 
prescribing  absolute  quiet.  But  her  .brother 
relates  that  she  kept  inquiring  for  Lincoln 
so  continuously,  at  times  demanding  to  see 
Mm,  that  the  family  at  last  sent  for  him.  On 
his  arrival  at  her  bedside,  the  door  was 
closed  and  he  was  left  alone  with  her.  What 
was  said  was  known  only  to  him  and  to  the 
dying  girl."  Her  death  took  place  August 
25th,  1835.  (Herndon  and  Weik's  Lincoln, 
Vol.  I,  p.  129.) 


LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 


BOOK  XII.  Mentor  Graham,  the  village 
schoolmaster,  was  intellectually  the  most  im- 
portant man  in  New  Salem  for  Lincoln.  The 
name  seems  a  curious  reminiscence  of  the 
Ithacan  Mentor,  the  voice  of  the  Goddess  of 
.Wisdom  to  the  young  Telemachus  (See  First 
Book  of  the  Odyssey).  It  was  Graham  who 
told  Lincoln  that  if  he  wished  to  be  a  public 
man.  and  to  make  speeches,  he  must  study 
grammar.  But  where  could  he  get  a  text- 
book? New  Salem  did  not  possess  a  copy. 
The  schoolmaster  knew  of  one  six  miles  away 
in  the  country.  Lincoln  at  once  walked  to 
the  place  and  borrowed  it,  and  must  have 
finally  owned  it,  for  he  gave  it  to  Ann  Eut- 
ledge.  Still  the  inscription  can  be  read  upon 
it  in  Lincoln's  handwriting:  "Ann  M.  Eut- 
ledge  is  now  studying  Grammar."  (A  fac- 
simile of  its  title  page  can  be  found  in  Miss 
Tarbell's  Lincoln,  I,  p.  65,  with  Lincoln's  in- 
scription). Graham  also  helped  Lincoln  in 
the  study  of  surveying,  when  the  latter  had 
received  the  appointment  of  assistant  sur- 
veyor of  Sangamon  County. 

The  pioneer  schoolmaster  followed  the 
frontier  settlements  and  never  failed  on  the 
march  of  migration.  He  was  found  on  the 
border  in  Kentucky,  in  Indiana  and  Illinois, 
during  Lincoln's  youth. 

BOOK  XIII,    Says  Herndon,   friend,  law- 


HISTORIC  INTIMATIONS.  347 

partner  and  biographer  of  Linocln:  "From 
my  own  knowledge  and  the  information  thus 
obtained  (from  the  score  or  more  of  witnesses 
whom  I  at  one  time  or  another  interviewed 
on  this  delicate  subject)  I  repeat  that  the 
memory  of  Ann  Rutledge  was  the  saddest 
chapter  in  Mr.  Lincoln's  life"  (I,  p.  119).  Ac- 
cording to  Herndon,  it  was  "Dr.  Jason  Dun- 
can who  placed  in  Lincoln's  hands  a  poem 
called  Immortality.  The  piece  starts  out  with 
the  line :  '  *  Oh,  why  should  the  spirit  of  mor- 
tal be  proud."  He  committed  these  lines 
to  memory  and  any  reference  to  or  mention 
of  Miss  Eutledge  would  suggest  them."  As 
late  as  March,  1864,  not  many  days  before  his 
death,  he  repeated  the  lines  with  a  strange 
premonitory  pathos.  The  poem  was  for  him 
"an  ever-singing  dirge  of  the  soul  over  the 
vanished  loved  one  with  the  melancholy  note 
of  which  his  deepest  emotions  become  con- 
cordant to  the  end  of  his  days.  Thus  Lincoln 
reveals  an  immortal  love,  which  will  attune 
all  the  other  throbbings  of  his  heart,  however 
profound  and  intense."  (Abraham  Lincoln, 
p.  172.) 

BOOK  XIV.  The  first  effect  of  the  blow 
upon  Lincoln  was  to  bring  him  into  a  condi- 
tion verging  toward  insanity.  Says  Herndon : 
*  *  He  had  fits  of  great  mental  depression  and 
wandered  up  and  down  the  river  and  into  the 


348  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUT  LEDGE. 

woods  woefully  abstracted— at  times  in  the 
deepest  distress.  His  condition  finally  be- 
came so  alarming  that  his  friends  consulted 
together  and  sent  him  to  the  house  of  a  kind 
friend  who  lived  in  a  secluded  spot  hidden 
by  the  hills  a  mile  south  of  the  town,  ami  who 
after  some  weeks  brought  him  back  to  rea- 
son, or  at  least  a  realization  of  his  true  con- 
dition." (Herndon  and  Weik's  Lincoln,  I, 
p.  130-1.) 

Doubtless  at  this  time  Lincoln  made  the 
greatest  spiritual  transition  of  his  life,  under 
the  most  severe  mental  and  emotional  strain. 

BOOK  XV.  As  already  stated,  New  Salem 
barely  lived  a  dozen  years,  if  quite  so  long. 
The  rapid  rise  and  often  the  equally  rapid 
decline  of  these  border  towns  could  be  often 
witnessed  in  the  early  settlement  of  the  "West. 
And  the  spirit  of  migration  was  never  want- 
ing to  the  frontiersman.  The  new  thing 
about  this  Western  town-building  was  that  its 
source  was  from  below  and  not  from  above — 
from  the  people  and  not  from  those  in  au- 
thority. All  felt  the  power  in  themselves  to 
re-make  their  village  elsewhere. 

BOOK  XVI.  "Lincoln  endures  the  awful 
strain  and  comes  forth  a  purified  soul  from 
tHe  discipline  of  Love,  but  he  carries  the 
mark  with  him  all  his  life.  What  did  it  do 
for  him  I ' '  That  is  a  question  pivotal  for  his 


HISTORIC  INTIMATIONS.  349 

whole  future;  but  different  persons  will  an- 
swer it  differently,  according  to  their  habits 
of  thought  and  inner  experience. 

"The  individual  Ann  Kutledge  is  gone,  in- 
deed, forever,  but  the  love  remains  and  will 
not  depart.  What  is  to  be  done  with  it?  Erad- 
icated it  cannot  be  unless  by  tearing  out  the 
heart  itself  by  the  roots.  But  it  can  be  trans- 
formed, or  rather  transfigured,  and  thus  in 
a  manner  be  preserved  ever  active  and  benefi- 
cent. From  the  individual  it  can  be  elevated 
into  universality,  and  thereby  not  only  save 
the  man,  but  give  him  a  new  birth,  a  spirit- 
ual palingenesis.  The  problem  with  Abraham 
Lincoln  now  is:  Can  I  transfigure  the  love 
of  this  individual  Ann  Butledge,  forever  van- 
ished as  individual,  into  an  universal  love 
for  Humanity,  ever-present  and  undying? 
Can  I  rise  even  through  emotion  from  the  one 
to  the  all?  Verily  he  can  and  does;  indeed 
the  terrible  ordeal  has  just  this  providential 
purpose :  he  must  come  to  feel  and  perchance 
to  see  that  the  painful  Discipline  of  Love  is 
not- to  destroy  it,  but  to  eternize  it  by  trans- 
figuring it  into  the  very  personality  of  the 
sufferer,  and  thus  making  it  the  inner  lumi- 
nary which  shines  through  character  and 
deeds."  (From  Abraham  Lincoln,  an  inter- 
pretation in  Biography,  p.  185.) 

"Here  we  may  behold,  if  not  the  original 


350  LINCOLN  AND  ANN  RUTLEDGE. 

germ,  at  least  the  grand  flowering  of  that 
deepest  and  all-pervasive  trait  of  Lincoln 
which  we  may  exalt  as  his  universal  Love/' 
which  "has  become  at  present  the  chief 
theme  of  anecdote,  reminiscence,  story,  novel, 
and  other  literary  utterance  pertaining  to 
Jiim  directly  and  indirectly."  (Ditto,  p. 
185-6.) 

"Though  called  upon  to  administer  a  na- 
tional discipline  as  severe  as  his  own  per- 
sonal discipline  ever  was,  he  did  it  not  in 
hate  and  revenge,  as  everybody  now  recog- 
nizes" (Ditto).  Finally  may  be  added  his 
tender  confession  made  to  a  friend  long  after- 
wards concerning  Ann  Kutledge:  "I  think 
often,  often  of  her  now." 


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